October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from June to end of July 2024

Starving children in Gaza

Starving children in Gaza

More on Palestine

The war in the Ukraine – what you’re not told – 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’?

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from October 2023 to end of February 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from March to end of May 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from August to end of October 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from November to the end of December 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from January to end of March 2025

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’?

Due to the failure of the international ‘community’ to do anything to stop the genocide and ethnic cleansing (over almost five months now) by the US-backed Zionist settler state in Occupied Palestine in Gaza the links to articles/podcasts etc., shining a light on this humanitarian disaster has grown exponentially. In order to make it easier for readers to keep up to date with the most recent news and views it has been decided to split the page, using the end of February 2024 as the cut off point.

However, this does not mean that earlier links have been deleted. They have merely been converted into a post and can be found by following the link on October 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from October 2023 to end of February 2024.

Reference material

Some people who visit this page might be familiar with the terms that are commonly used in the articles, the links to which are provided below. However, some may not. That being the case it seems to be a good idea to give a few definitions of some of the more often used terminology. These definitions have been provided by Comrades at bannedthought, a site that also provides a great deal of material about revolutionary movements throughout the world.

Zionism

‘Two-state solution’ (Palestine)

Zionism — and the creation of Israel

Zionism — and imperialism

‘Greater Israel’

Nakba

For some of the documents that explain that what the US-backed Zionist settler state is now carrying out in Gaza (and also in the West Bank) is nothing new – and is the basis of Zionism and the illegal establishment of the state of Israel – you might find it interesting to go to The Facts about the Palestine ‘Problem’ and Palestine – the background to the US-backed Zionist settler state.

Statements by various organisations following the events of October 7th 2023;

Joint Statements by Multiple Organizations

October 28, 2023 Joint Statement, of 5 organizations: Hamas (Islamic Resistance Movement); Palestinian Islamic Jihad; Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine; Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine; and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—General Command. 2 pages.

Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)

November 8, 2023 Statement, 1 page.

October 28, 2023 Statement, by the Office of Martyrs, Prisoners, and Wounded for the PFLP, 1 page.

October 28, 2023 Statement, 1 page.

October 17, 2023 Statement, 1 page.

October 12, 2023 Statement, 2 pages.

October 7, 2023 Statement, 2 pages.

Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP)

October 8, 2023 Statement: Al-Aqsa Flood – a slap to the Israeli Security System, 4 pages. This is the initial DFLP public response to the Hamas-led uprising of October 7, 2023.

October 25, 2023 Statement: Letter from DFLP to political parties and societal forces in the world. Crimes continue in the Gaza Strip… and the number of massacres rises to about 600, 2 pages.

Non-dated Statement (but post-October 7, 2023): The future of the Gaza Strip is an internal Palestinian matter, 5 pages.

01 June 2024

The US empire isn’t a government that runs nonstop wars, it’s a nonstop war that runs a government.

01 June 2024

Israeli blackmail op exposed by Norm Finkelstein – Israel is a Jewish Supremacist State.

01 June 2024

Nothing is off the table in Netanyahu’s Mafia state of Israel.

01 June 2024

‘Jabalia is the birthplace of uprisings’: Israeli army withdraws, but the camp remains.

01 June 2024

Understanding Biden’s proposal for a Gaza ceasefire.

02 June 2024

They can’t control the Gaza narrative because too much has been seen.

02 June 2024

Not just coastal elites: here’s how three Rust Belt colleges protested Israel’s war in Gaza.

02 June 2024

Netanyahu is back and leading the polls, all thanks to the ICC.

02 June 2024

Israel is committing genocide. Its enablers can be held to account.

03 June 2024

Why I don’t condemn Hamas for October 7.

03 June 2024

How we’ve failed the promise of making ‘genocide’ a crime. The lawyer Raphael Lemkin hoped to use international law to curb abuses of power. But his efforts were curtailed from the start.

03 June 2024

Gaza: The Donkey and the Fate of Western Civilization.

03 June 2024

‘No one is above the law’ – really Mr. Biden?

03 June 2024

Against a world without Palestinians.

03 June 2024

San Jose State University professor says she was suspended over her Palestine activism.

03 June 2024

Israel contradicts Biden over ceasefire proposal.

03 June 2024

Israel ‘boosterism’ keeps Israel bonds afloat even as some top global investors exit.

03 June 2024

Columbia Law Review refused to take down article on Palestine, so its Board of Directors nuked the whole website.

04 June 2024

Beyond two state solution – why recognizing state of Palestine is important.

04 June 2024

‘We are the World Power’.

04 June 2024

‘Our friend’: How the Israel lobby spent £30,000 on Wes Streeting.

05 June 2024

Mass graves and body bags: al-Shifa hospital after Israel withdrew its forces. [Will the BBC change the manner in which it ‘reports on’ the Gaza following this ‘revelation’? Unlikely.]

05 June 2024

Lebanon’s Hezbollah is proving to be a serious problem for Israel.

05 June 2024

A Federal Judge visited Israel on a junket designed to sway public opinion. Now he’s hearing a Gaza case.

05 June 2024

Rafah clash exposes roots of Egypt and Israel tension.

05 June 2024

Benjamin Netanyahu confronts the United States.

05 June 2024

Do you condemn Hamas?

05 June 2024

Israel threatening to take on Hezbollah after cross-border attacks produce intense wildfires.

05 June 2024

Lebanon: Israel’s white phosphorous use risks civilian harm.

05 June 2024

Israel lobby funded a quarter of British MPs.

06 June 2024

Israeli strike on UN shelter in Gaza kills at least 27. [Even as the genocide continues the BBC still gives more weight to statements from the military of the Zionist settler state than to those of the Palestinians. All the Zionists have to say is that ‘Hamas’ were in the vicinity for them to get away, literally, with murder and the BBC doesn’t bat an eyelid.]

06 June 2024

Witnesses tell of ‘unimaginable’ Gaza shelter air strike. [‘No evidence was immediately given’ by the IDF – and never will be. Also notice, as always, ‘Hamas-run government media office says’ after years of demonising the organisation this immediately puts doubt in some people’s minds on the truth of their words.]

06 June 2024

End of an era: pro-Palestine language exposes Israel, Zionism.

06 June 2024

‘The generation that says no more’: Inside the Columbia University encampments for Palestine.

06 June 2024

Announcing the launch of the online Popular University for Gaza.

06 June 2024

Israel commits new massacre in strike on UNRWA school in Nuseirat.

06 June 2024

NAACP calls on Biden-Harris administration to halt weapons shipments to Israel, push for immediate and permanent ceasefire.

06 June 2024

Israel secretly targets U.S. lawmakers with influence campaign on Gaza war.

06 June 2024

Prof. John J. Mearsheimer: What if Gaza and Ukraine escalate?

06 June 2024

Columbia Law Review is back online after students threatened work stoppage over Palestine censorship.

06 June 2024

Judge who went on Israel junket recuses himself from Gaza case.

06 June 2024

‘Not the career in Public Service I signed up for’: Federal Workers protest war.

07 June 2024

Academia is only as free as powerful donors allow it to be.

07 June 2024

When opposing a genocide means you’re a Nazi.

07 June 2024

War on Gaza: US courts must hold Biden accountable.

07 June 2024

Full text of Israel’s Gaza ceasefire proposal announced by Biden.

07 June 2024

Civil ICC case against Ursula von der Leyen raises stakes on genocide complicity.

07 June 2024

The brutalization of Israel is well underway. If we do not act, its collapse is only a matter of time.

07 June 2024

Israel’s progression from Apartheid to Genocide.

07 June 2024

The genocide in Israeli prisons.

07 June 2024

Snatch-and-grab Israeli style: disappearing into the Gulag.

08 June 2024

Everything about Israel is fake.

08 June 2024

Israel kills over 200 Palestinians to rescue 4 captives; U.S. allegedly involved in operation.

08 June 2024

The invisibility of Palestinian Christians.

08 June 2024

The Biden administration must stop Israel before it escalates in Lebanon.

09 June 2024

Gaza health ministry says Israeli hostage rescue killed 274 Palestinians. [Racism in practice – and reporting.]

09 June 2024

‘I heard all of my friends’ last breath’: Testimonies from the Nuseirat massacre.

09 June 2024

My Nuseirat.

09 June 2024

The media skew public perception by manipulating people’s attention.

09 June 2024

Why Hamas cannot accept Biden/Israeli ceasefire proposal.

09 June 2024

US involved in Israeli operation that killed over 200 Palestinians.

09 June 2024

Supporting genocide to halt multipolarity.

10 June 2024

Saving Gaza is about more than saving Gaza. It’s also about saving ourselves.

10 June 2024

Complaints about Hamas using ‘human shields’ are the worst kind of bad faith.

10 June 2024

Inviting Netanyahu to Congress is like ‘a bad horror movie’.

10 June 2024

How Israel’s illiberal democracy became a model for the right.

10 June 2024

Alastair Crooke : Israel and reality – on the ‘Two State Solution’.

10 June 2024

The ‘Hamas question’ and the Left with Abdaljawad Omar – Podcast.

10 June 2024

Israel kills 274 Palestinians while freeing four Israeli prisoners in Gaza; Gantz resigns from war cabinet.

10 June 2024

Inside the Nuseirat Massacre: This is the carnage I saw during Israel’s hostage rescue.

10 June 2024

The British-Israeli soldiers at risk of Gaza war crimes probe.

11 June 2024

Gaza resistance sources say fear is rising U.S. pier will be used for forced displacement of Palestinians.

11 June 2024

The new Jewish international: taking back the power of definition.

11 June 2024

‘People’s red line’ surrounds the White House to demand end of Gaza genocide.

11 June 2024

The fallacy of the ‘wrong side of history’ narrative.

11 June 2024

Ignoring daily massacres in Gaza while still babbling about October 7.

11 June 2024

Israeli troops disguised themselves as Palestinians during hostage rescue operation – ABC.

11 June 2024

The British spy squad assisting Israel as it bombs Gaza.

11 June 2024

Britain greenlit dozens of arms deals with Israel amid Gaza war.

11 June 2024

Apple matches worker donations to IDF and illegal settlements, employees allege.

12 June 2024

Give New York to the Mormons.

12 June 2024

The day the West defined ‘success’ as a massacre of 270 Palestinians.

12 June 2024

When the powerful control public opinion, elections aren’t real.

12 June 2024

Land of the Free? Phil Giraldi.

12 June 2024

‘Their message is, The Empire Strikes Back’: Breaking down AIPAC’s role in the 2024 election.

12 June 2024

What comes after Gantz’s resignation?

12 June 2024

‘We are going to hurt you’: UC Santa Cruz chancellor unleashes police mayhem against student protesters.

12 June 2024

Israel’s new air war in the West Bank: nearly half of the dead are children.

12 June 2024

House votes to block U.S. funding to rebuild Gaza.

13 June 2024

Israel joins UN ‘list of shame’ for abuses against children in war.

13 June 2024

The night Israel killed my family.

13 June 2024

No need for ‘Jewish values’ in the fight for Palestine.

13 June 2024

Blinken and Hamas exchange accusations of obstructing ceasefire deal.

13 June 2024

How the media failed the college student encampments.

13 June 2024

Remembering the Holocaust while Gaza starves.

13 June 2024

Israel’s descent.

13 June 2024

Medical aid worker describes the bloody aftermath of Israel’s hostage rescue.

14 June 2024

Behold the world gently.

14 June 2024

No way out in Nuseirat: the great hostage rescue massacre.

14 June 2024

America isolated: why some western capitals are shifting positions on Gaza.

14 June 2024

The story of the U.S. ‘floating dock’ built from the rubble of Gaza’s homes.

14 June 2024

Why the fight for Palestine is the fight against U.S. imperialism in the region.

14 June 2024

What Gantz’s exit reveals about Israel’s failed Gaza strategy.

14 June 2024

John Mearsheimer: the Biden Admin is lying about the cease fire deal and Hamas.

14 June 2024

FBI Whistleblower exposes Israel’s chokehold on American politics.

14 June 2024

Why the Senate must reject the dangerous Anti-Semitism Awareness Act.

14 June 2024

Diamonds and coal dust: slaughter at Nuseirat.

14 June 2024

Spreading the fiction of an anti-Semitism epidemic on the Left.

14 June 2024

These ‘tent massacre’ survivors couldn’t afford to leave Rafah. The next Israeli attack nearly wiped their family out.

15 June 2024

Blinken’s lies about Hamas rejecting a ceasefire reveal the Biden administration’s true intentions.

15 June 2024

How Israel’s massacre of 270 Palestinians in Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp unfolded.

15 June 2024

Uncommitted voters sending a clear message to Biden about slaughter in Gaza.

15 June 2024

‘I ain’t reading all that; Free Palestine’.

16 June 2024

We’ve seen this ‘anti-Semitism crisis on the left’ script before.

16 June 2024

Divestment at the University of Edinburgh: Breaking from Balfour’s colonial legacy.

16 June 2024

Rotten to the Core: How the Gaza genocide has revealed anti-Palestinian racism at Apple.

16 June 2024

NYT’s fatuous effort to preserve Black-Jewish coalition sweeps genocide under the rug.

16 June 2024

Despite possibility of ceasefire, U.S. imperial ambitions may doom Palestine.

16 June 2024

Serial criminals rule Israel. That’s where the collapse begins.

17 June 2024

Netanyahu dissolves Israel’s war cabinet.

17 June 2024

The U.S. power structure is blindly dedicated to Israel.

17 June 2024

Columbia task force finally weighs in: yes, anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism.

17 June 2024

International Criminal Court members speak out.

18 June 2024

The kibbutzniks blocking humanitarian aid to Gaza.

18 June 2024

The United States is the main obstacle to peace in Palestine.

18 June 2024

UN Commission finds Israel guilty of crimes against humanity.

18 June 2024

What’s next for the Uncommitted campaign?

18 June 2024

‘Utterly dismayed’: [US] Air Force engineer resigns as dissent against Gaza war slowly spreads within military.

19 June 2024

War clouds over Lebanon as Hezbollah and Israel clash.

19 June 2024

As boycott grows, Ocasio-Cortez says Netanyahu invitation ‘should be revoked’. [Although, in her attacks on what she considers to be anti-Semitism of some on the ‘left’, AOC seems to want it both ways.]

19 June 2024

Fractious arenas: Netanyahu dissolves the ‘war cabinet’.

19 June 2024

The Asian American Foundation’s ADL partnership is a betrayal to Asian American communities.

19 June 2024

Progressive organizations launch Reject AIPAC to counter the pro-Israel lobby.

19 June 2024

Netanyahu’s tantrum; Russia’s new offer and Ukraine’s new excuse.

20 June 2024

Shining the light on Gaza.

20 June 2024

How much more proof does Biden need that Netanyahu is not a U.S. ally?

20 June 2024

Threat of all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah rises.

20 June 2024

‘We’re refusing to let ourselves live in comfortable complacency’: Scenes from the Cardiff encampment for Palestine.

20 June 2024

Battle-tested in Gaza: Britain’s next drones?

21 June 2024

Understanding Israel’s threats of war with Hezbollah.

21 June 2024

Gaza’s hospitals are empty, and patients die in silence.

21 June 2024

Netanyahu: Give us the tools, we’ll continue the genocide.

21 June 2024

How a hedge fund manager and right-wing donor is financing an Israeli influence op masquerading as a journalism project.

21 June 2024

Biden team ignores Israel’s history of deceit and deception.

21 June 2024

Firewalls of ignorance and disappearance: corporate media in the age of fascist politics.

21 June 2024

Israel opposes rebuilding Gaza’s internet access because terrorists could go online.

21 June 2024

How mainstream media ignores UK military support for Israel.

21 June 2024

Israeli army probe finds multiple cases of friendly fire on October 7.

21 June 2024

Peace, peace, when there is no peace – The Grayzone live. Aaron Mate and Max Blumenthal discuss new mainstream coverage of negotiations between Ukraine and Russia back in 2023 amid Zelensky’s bogus peace summit, Russian retaliation against US arming of Ukraine, new threats by Netanyahu against a cowering Biden administration, and Israel’s continuing onslaught against Gaza.

21 June 2024

Forensic Architecture probe concludes Israeli tank likely killed Palestinian child Hind Rajab.

21 June 2024

Sight of Israeli Druze fighting in Gaza horrifies Lebanon’s community.

22 June 2024

Quibbling about killing: Netanyahu’s spat with Washington.

22 June 2024

Israeli army strapped wounded Palestinian to jeep.

22 June 2024

Wounded Palestinian man strapped to front of Israeli army vehicle, used as human shield.

22 June 2024

The myth of Israeli democracy died in Gaza and Israel’s hasbara will never recover.

22 June 2024

Ten Holocaust survivors condemn Israel’s Gaza genocide.

23 June 2024

How Israel became a nuclear power.

23 June 2024

Republicans demonstrate their terrifying Palestine policy.

23 June 2024

The International Olympic Committee must sanction Israel over its genocidal war in Gaza. [The fact that they aren’t just goes to demonstrate western hypocrisy – but whether such bans are useful remains a moot point.]

24 June 2024

If Gaza opened your eyes to the Empire’s depravity, make sure they stay open forever.

24 June 2024

Netanyahu says he refuses to end the war on Gaza.

24 June 2024

Feminist scholars stand with Professor Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian.

24 June 2024

Ray McGovern: Mossad in the Pentagon? [From about 16 minutes.]

24 June 2024

Democrats, Parties, and Palestine: Five stages of political grief.

24 June 2024

Remember the Palestinian doctors killed by Israel.

24 June 2024

Washington faces defeat in Red Sea.

25 June 2024

Lebanon this summer: the upcoming Hezbollah-Israel war will end with one of the two scenarios.

25 June 2024

Armed vs. peaceful resistance – what you need to know about Muqawama in Gaza.

25 June 2024

Despite warnings, Israel looks set to jump off Lebanon ledge.

25 June 2024

The mainstream media is setting the stage for an Israeli war on Lebanon.

25 June 2024

For opposing genocide, Bowman is framed as anti-Semitic — by liberal Zionists.

25 June 2024

Israel’s war on Gaza is the deadliest conflict on record for journalists.

25 June 2024

The day Israeli tanks fired directly at AFP’s Gaza bureau.

25 June 2024

Red Crescent says Israel never reached out about Hind Rajab’s death, despite State Department claim that Israel said otherwise.

25 June 2024

Half-hearted efforts by Democratic leaders couldn’t save Jamaal Bowman from AIPAC’s attacks.

25 June 2024

How Israel funds UK parliamentary staff.

26 June 2024

The ‘Israel Lobby’ works for the US military industrial complex.

26 June 2024

Gaza and Gazans can’t disappear.

26 June 2024

Israel targets US public with massive propaganda campaign.

26 June 2024

AIPAC’s defeat of Jamaal Bowman disguises its weakness.

26 June 2024

What Jamaal Bowman’s defeat means.

26 June 2024

Latimer defeats Bowman with $15 million worth of help from AIPAC.

26 June 2024

Progressives on AIPAC’s defeat of Bowman: ‘Now we know how much it costs to buy an election’.

26 June 2024

The night that won’t end in Gaza. A new documentary tells the stories of three Palestinian families as they have fought to survive nine months of genocide.

27 June 2024

Who will champion Gaza’s bombed and starved children in the UK elections?

27 June 2024

Growing up in Nuseirat – where massacres become routine.

27 June 2024

Three Israeli army reservists explain why they refuse to continue serving in Gaza.

27 June 2024

Lessons of Bowman’s loss – no, it wasn’t a generalized defeat for ‘the left’.

27 June 2024

Israel’s leaked plan for annexing the West Bank, explained.

27 June 2024

UN agency says Gazans face ‘catastrophic’ food insecurity.

27 June 2024

Israeli officer killed, 16 other soldiers injured in Jenin refugee camp during army invasion.

27 June 2024

Mounting troubles for Uncle Sam and his friends in Israel and Ukraine.

27 June 2024

62 Democrats join 207 Republicans in vote to conceal Gaza death toll.

28 June 2024

Will Israel provoke a cataclysm?

28 June 2024

The second invasion of al-Shuja’iyya is a war of attrition.

28 June 2024

Columbia University Hind’s Hall defendants reject deals in solidarity with the CUNY 22.

28 June 2024

Liberal Zionism: gatekeeping criticism of genocide.

28 June 2024

Stories of survival and suffering: inside Gaza’s Al-Aqsa Hospital.

28 June 2024

The occupation of Gaza: Nine months of struggle.

28 June 2024

The Altalena Affair: is Israel heading towards a Civil War?

28 June 2024

Trump used ‘Palestinian’ as a slur. Biden and debate moderators didn’t say a word.

29 June 2024

We carried my mother’s body for miles so we could bury her.

29 June 2024

In Tehran, Gaza rekindles the revolution.

01 July 2024

Craig Murray’s campaign against empire.

01 July 2024

This obvious genocide is not what it looks like.

01 July 2024

‘For the resistance’: Tulkarem residents face Israeli airstrikes and assassinations.

01 July 2024

Emergency statement on the health and human rights crisis in the West Bank.

01 July 2024

Israeli leaders slam prison services over release of al-Shifa Hospital director.

02 July 2024

Former Israeli PM admits Israel’s war crimes can’t happen without US support.

02 July 2024

Oh no, now the US has to stop imprisoning ex-presidents for their crimes!

02 July 2024

Israel in Gaza: The Jewish break with Zionism.

02 July 2024

On aid and war – how Israel has used starvation to subdue the Palestinians.

02 July 2024

The Left has played a key role in the Palestinian struggle.

02 July 2024

The Toronto Jewish community has a genocide problem.

02 July 2024

CUNY encampment felony charges could set a dangerous precedent for Palestine organizing.

02 July 2024

Pro-Israel tycoon gives Labour half a million pounds.

03 July 2024

The Houthis turn the Red Sea redder, stymieing Israel and the US.

03 July 2024

‘Gaza is complicated!’ No it isn’t. Grow up.

03 July 2024

‘Hamas has never been stronger’: Israel is stuck in a war it can’t win.

03 July 2024

Another American war in the Middle East?

03 July 2024

Whether it’s Biden or someone else, Gaza remains top priority for ‘uncommitted’ voters.

03 July 2024

Understanding Israel’s ‘System of Domination’. Author Nathan Thrall’s recent book tells the story of one Palestinian family living under Israel occupation.

03 July 2024

The philosophy of Hamas in the writings of Yahya Sinwar.

03 July 2024

Israel’s starvation policy in Gaza is forcing people to eat tree leaves.

03 July 2024

‘The land theft continues’: Israel announces biggest West Bank seizure in over 30 years.

03 July 2024

Prof. John Mearsheimer: China in the wings. [Palestine from minute 20.]

04 July 2024

Hamas faces growing public dissent as Gaza war erodes support. [After months of just being stenographers for the Zionist settler state the BBC is now producing its own pro-Zionist propaganda.]

04 July 2024

Israelis urge Netanyahu to accept U.S. ceasefire deal as Hamas gives its response.

04 July 2024

Inside the congressional effort to provide Palestinians with Refugee Status.

04 July 2024

Pali-Rican solidarities: the dizzying parallels of colonial occupation.

04 July 2024

An American genocide: Tommy Orange, Francine Prose and Leonard Peltier.

04 July 2024

War on Gaza: how Hamas lured Israel into a lethal trap.

05 July 2024

Why there is no uprising in the West Bank – yet.

05 July 2024

Liberal Zionists answer the Gaza genocide by appealing for ‘nuance’.

05 July 2024

Sharon revisited: Netanyahu’s ultimate aim in Gaza and why it will fail.

06 July 2024

‘Disturbing milestone’: Israeli settler attacks in West Bank surpass 1,000 since October 7.

06 July 2024

A hollow Palestinian state.

06 July 2024

If you support Israel in the middle of a genocide, you’re an awful person.

07 July 2024

Silenced at school: NYC Public Schools Chancellor suppresses Palestinian voices.

07 July 2024

Why Big Tech’s control of social media cannot stop anti-colonial resistance.

08 July 2024

OMG Haaretz is Hamas propaganda now!

08 July 2024

Israeli newspaper confirms IDF employed ‘Hannibal directive’ on October 7.

08 July 2024

Starmer learnt that the price of power was support for genocide.

08 July 2024

The Frankfurt Book Fair and multinational publishers are complicit in the Gaza genocide.

08 July 2024

Why the Israeli army is expanding its invasion of Gaza City.

08 July 2024

Top Israeli security officials ‘shocked’ by Netanyahu’s attempts to sabotage ceasefire proposal.

08 July 2024

The Gaza genocide: who’s complicit?

08 July 2024

War and famine.

09 July 2024

Oh, looks like bombing hospitals is bad again.

09 July 2024

How do we control Palestinians? We make them feel like we are everywhere’.

09 July 2024

The companies making it easy to buy in a West Bank settlement.

09 July 2024

Huge majority of M.E scholars say Gaza onslaught is ‘akin to genocide’, but they self-censor their views.

09 July 2024

Biden was already a vulnerable candidate because of the genocide.

09 July 2024

Israel lobby funded half of Keir Starmer’s cabinet.

10 July 2024

Why the news media’s job is to groom us.

10 July 2024

In Bad Faith with Mohammed El-Kurd.

10 July 2024

Even Centrists are questioning Biden. But the Squad is divided.

10 July 2024

Israel’s leading paper says its own army deliberately killed Israelis on October 7. But in the U.S. media: silence.

10 July 2024

The duty of mental health professionals in the struggle for Palestine.

11 July 2024

Aaron Maté: whitewashing mass murder.

11 July 2024

Nonstop news stories proving Palestine supporters right about everything.

11 July 2024

Settler colonialism and the engineering of historical amnesia.

11 July 2024

IDF ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7 to prevent Hamas taking soldiers captive. [The original Haaretz article.]

11 July 2024

Why the West Bank is on the verge of economic collapse.

11 July 2024

Israel orders Gaza City residents to flee south — again.

11 July 2024

Prof. John Mearsheimer: Ukraine collapsing. The situation in Gaza comes in at 17 minutes.

11 July 2024

Russia attacks hospitals in Ukraine [although not proven]. Israel does the same in Gaza. The U.S. response couldn’t be more different.

12 July 2024

The mainstream worldview is a mass-produced artificial psychosis.

12 July 2024

The Old Evil – Chris Hedges.

12 July 2024

Biden or not, U.S. policy on Palestine stays the same.

12 July 2024

Chain of fools – The Grayzone live. Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate discuss plans announced by NATO at its Washington DC summit to escalate conflicts across the globe and its expand its ranks, the vindication of their reporting on Israel’s scandalous Hannibal Directive, the ongoing meltdown over Joe Biden’s cognitive decline, and much more.

12 July 2024

We must understand Israel as a settler-colonial state.

12 July 2024

Rekindling the old love affair: can Trump save Netanyahu?

12 July 2024

Columbia Law Professor smeared by Israel supporters could lose her job.

12 July 2024

Palestinian with Down syndrome ‘left to die’ by Israeli soldiers after combat dog attack.

13 July 2024

The Biden administration has exposed the brain rot of western liberals.

13 July 2024

Now the anemone flowers will decorate his grave.

14 July 2024

The destruction of healthcare in Gaza and the scientific assessment of settler colonial violence.

14 July 2024

The US came close to having TWO presidential candidates with no brain.

14 July 2024

Testimonies from the Mawasi massacre: 90 people buried in the sand.

15 July 2024

There’s an important lesson in all these Democrats wishing Trump a speedy recovery.

15 July 2024

Israel’s inertial genocide.

15 July 2024

The Gaza genocide deepens: the reckoning begins for the perpetrators.

15 July 2024

Israel is falling apart, and American leaders are in denial.

15 July 2024

Israel bombs three Gaza displacement centers, killing hundreds.

15 July 2024

David Lammy’s visit to Israel was a disgrace. He must now act on arms sales and Unrwa.

16 July 2024

Devastation in Gaza poses an increasingly serious problem for Starmer. [The caveat in the Naked capitalism introduction is worth consideration.]

16 July 2024

Israel’s legalization of settlements in the northern West Bank, explained.

16 July 2024

There is no path to peace that does not involve Hamas.

16 July 2024

How the Israeli extreme right has achieved victory.

16 July 2024

Groups blocking aid to Gaza got donations from US and Israel.

16 July 2024

A cancer on the West Bank.

16 July 2024

Palestinian Islamic Jihad: ‘Oslo is over’.

17 July 2024

Resisting Israeli scholasticide and academic apartheid.

17 July 2024

Assessing the Flames of Protest.

17 July 2024

Mercenary or scholar: disrupting military-funded research at the University of California.

17 July 2024

‘They are trying to buy this seat’: Can Cori Bush beat AIPAC?

17 July 2024

‘I can’t erase all the blood from my mind’ October 7 assault on Israel – Human Rights Watch. [The full report is being reproduced here to demonstrate how some so-called human rights organisations are merely ‘stenographers’ for the West and the Zionist settler state. Virtually ALL the claims in this report have been refuted after having been given high profile publicity by the western mainstream media earlier in the year. For example, there is no mention whatsoever of the ‘Hannibal Directive’ which has been proven caused a significant number of deaths and casualties.]

18 July 2024

Israel seeks to redraw the Laws of War.

18 July 2024

‘I’m bored, so I shoot’: the Israeli army’s approval of free-for-all violence in Gaza.

18 July 2024

The student encampments were only the start.

18 July 2024

Netanyahu accused of obstructing prisoner talks while Israel and PA negotiate future of Rafah crossing.

18 July 2024

Here’s how a collective of tech professionals shut down the Israeli army’s extortion website — twice.

18 July 2024

LA city council considers paying former IDF soldiers to patrol its streets.

18 July 2024

£1 billion subsidy for arms company exposed.

19 July 2024

Israeli soldiers tell story of savage cruelty in Gaza – one hidden from western publics.

19 July 2024

The end of Israel’s economy.

19 July 2024

US academia and the censoring of an anti-Zionist professor.

19 July 2024

GOP takes aim at Palestine at Republican National Convention.

19 July 2024

When supporting Israel is a liability: is Gaza changing the West?

19 July 2024

To a starving orphan who died alone in rubble.

19 July 2024

Israel is an occupier – Top UN court

19 July 2024

In a historic ruling, ICJ declares Israeli occupation unlawful, calls for settlements to be evacuated, and for Palestinian reparations.

19 July 2024

The ICJ ruling confirms what Palestinians have been saying for 57 years.

19 July 2024

Israel lobbyist in House of Lords claims thousands of pounds in public money.

19 July 2024

World Court finds Israel responsible for apartheid.

20 July 2024

He called the dog habibi.

20 July 2024

Netanyahu’s speech to Congress will seek to maintain support for genocide.

20 July 2024

Zionism: the end of an illusion.

20 July 2024

Mobilizing global support for Gaza’s mental health emergency.

20 July 2024

Government by gunplay – The Grayzone live. Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate discuss the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, the high and lowlights of the RNC, the Democratic Party elite’s push for Joe Biden to drop out of the race, the CrowdStrike IT disaster, Max Boot-gate, and the latest from Gaza.

21 July 2024

The ‘criticizing Israel is anti-Semitic’ narrative reinforces itself.

21 July 2024

Polio and the destruction of Gaza’s health infrastructure.

21 July 2024

Deceive, defy, and defer: Netanyahu’s time-tested strategy to out-manoeuvre Biden.

21 July 2024

Palestinian Christians challenge the World Council of Churches on Gaza.

22 July 2024

Genocide monster drops out, endorses fellow genocide monster.

22 July 2024

Scott Ritter: Hezbollah crushes the IDF and embarrasses Israel in stunning defeat! – if the Zionist settler state attempts to move north.

22 July 2024

Calls to boycott Netanyahu speech grow as Israeli PM heads to DC.

22 July 2024

Looking at Kamala Harris’s record on Israel.

22 July 2024

West Bank settlers brutally attack Palestinians and American volunteers day after ICJ rules Israeli occupation illegal.

22 July 2024

U.S. media downplays and ignores ICJ ruling declaring Israeli occupation illegal.

22 July 2024

Israel launches a new offensive on Khan Younis forcing thousands to again flee.

22 July 2024

UK covers up Gaza spy footage from day of aid worker massacre.

23 July 2024

Israel: detainees face inhumane treatment.

23 July 2024

Dozens of lawmakers are protesting Netanyahu — but have little to say about Israel’s systemic abuses of Palestinians.

23 July 2024

Biden’s failing mind might explain his incoherent Gaza policy.

23 July 2024

Middle East heating up: increased Hezbollah, Houthi attacks on Israel after Israel strike on Yemen port.

23 July 2024

Vote for six-headed zombie Hitler to stop seven-headed zombie Hitler.

23 July 2024

Gaza is the single defining feature of this political moment in the US.

23 July 2024

Honoring Netanyahu; dishonoring America.

23 July 2024

The World Court has cleared the fog hiding western support for Israel’s crimes.

23 July 2024

Israeli strike targets press tent at Gaza hospital, killing one and injuring others.

23 July 2024

Pro-Palestine orgs and lawmakers react to Biden dropping out.

23 July 2024

Biden staffers who resigned over Gaza say US has destroyed international law and endangered Americans.

24 July 2024

Conventional wisdom: The ICJ ruling on Israeli settlements.

24 July 2024

Netanyahu insulted and smeared the pro-Palestine protest movement. Congress clapped.

24 July 2024

Rights groups demand Biden give answers on Israel’s secret influence campaign on Congress.

24 July 2024

What it’s like for Palestinian women living through the Gaza genocide.

24 July 2024

Major unions are calling for an end to Israeli military aid.

24 July 2024

Israel falsely warned it would bomb a media office. The actual airstrike killed journalists on a nearby street.

24 July 2024

Wanted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu addresses Congress.

24 July 2024

Israel kills 11 Palestinians in 24 hours in the West Bank.

25 July 2024

Netanyahu’s speech was as American as it gets.

25 July 2024

[British] Labour [Party] versus International Law.

25 July 2024

The International Court of Justice is a bad joke.

25 July 2024

‘Guilty of genocide’: 135 Congress members boycott Netanyahu’s speech to Congress.

25 July 2024

Netanyahu’s bellicose Congressional address draws scorn.

25 July 2024

Remembering Eman Qamom.

25 July 2024

How Israel plans to whitewash its war crimes in Gaza.

25 July 2024

American obeisance.

25 July 2024

The politics of water under occupation: Israel in Palestine.

25 July 2024

Palestinians slam Netanyahu speech to Congress as U.S. officials say a ceasefire deal is close.

25 July 2024

Depraved: the legal entanglement with Israel.

25 July 2024

Craig Mokhiber dissects the ICJ’s bombshell ruling on the Israeli occupation.

25 July 2024

Google planned to sponsor IDF conference that now denies Google was sponsor.

26 July 2024

U.S. Congress cheers and applauds Netanyahu’s speech.

26 July 2024

Only a failing US empire would be so blind as to cheer Netanyahu and his genocide.

26 July 2024

Israel gave US Congress weapons wishlist – Politico.

26 July 2024

The decimation of Gaza’s Academia is ‘impossible to quantify’.

26 July 2024

Israel economy bleeding out as damage compounds.

26 July 2024

Palestinian factions strike a reconciliation deal – will this time be any different?

26 July 2024

Canada set to revoke Jewish National Fund’s charitable status.

26 July 2024

Netanyahu’s Congressional address and Kamala Harris on Israel and Palestine.

26 July 2024

Dear Leader – The Grayzone live. Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate cover the gut-wrenching spectacle of Benjamin Netanyahu’s welcome to Washington and report back from the mass protests that met him at the US Capitol. Anya Parampil joins to discuss Venezuela’s upcoming election, where the US persists in its push for regime change. The section about Venezuela is from the beginning to just after minute 45 – then it goes on to the Zionist in Congress.

26 July 2024

Netanyahu in Congress: the crime boss fulminates, while his accomplices cheer.

26 July 2024

The US must stop arming Israel.

26 July 2024

War with China will negate peace with Russia.

27 July 2024

Trump sheepdogs both the right and the left into supporting status quo politics.

27 July 2024

Living in a nightmare.

27 July 2024

Unions call on Biden to halt military aid to Israel.

27 July 2024

20 years of struggle: renewing our commitment to liberation for the Holy Land 5.

27 July 2024

Palestinian-American Congresswoman is the lone protester at Netanyahu’s speech.

28 July 2024

Congress applauded the genocide in Gaza, but Netanyahu’s speech showed the political consensus on Israel is over.

28 July 2024

The virus that causes polio has been found in Gaza. Here’s why that is grim news.

28 July 2024

More dead children. More BBC ‘news’ channelling Israeli propaganda as its own.

28 July 2024

The Intifada of the Stones: an excerpt from Nasser Abu Srour’s ‘The Tale of a Wall’.

29 July 2024

Falsely accusing Biden and Harris of hating Israel; falsely accusing Trump of loving Russia.

29 July 2024

‘Bad on foreign policy but good on domestic policy’ is just American supremacist psychopathy.

29 July 2024

The IDF just destroyed a key Rafah water facility Rachel Corrie spent her last month of life defending.

29 July 2024

In the West Bank village of Burin, kites are a form of resistance.

29 July 2024

Israel and Lebanon brace for new escalation after 12 Syrian residents of the Golan Heights were killed by a strike.

29 July 2024

The relative value of life and death.

30 July 2024

Who are the Syrian Druze of Majdal Shams?

30 July 2024

Boycotts against Israel are hurting Starbucks and McDonald’s sales worldwide.

31 July 2024

Today in ‘every accusation is a confession’.

31 July 2024

Israel assassinates Hamas negotiator, Ismail Haniyeh, in Iran, leading to condemnation across Muslim world; Israel attempts assassination of Hezbollah leader in Beirut; Settler Brownshirt rampage against IDF wins Knesset backing.

31 July 2024

UN probe finds ‘appalling acts’ of torture against Palestinians detained by Israel.

31 July 2024

Israel has all but declared war in the Middle East – a conflict it cannot hope to win.

31 July 2024

The real reason Israel is assassinating Hamas and Hezbollah leaders, and why it won’t stop the resistance.

31 July 2024

U.S. officials react to Israeli assassinations of Hezbollah and Hamas leaders.

31 July 2024

Israel assassinates Hamas and Hezbollah leaders: What comes next for the region?

31 July 2024

GW [George Washington University] pressured federal prosecutors to ban students from campus in retaliation for encampment protests.

31 July 2024

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: US subservient to Israel.

31 July 2024

Israel sure looks like it wants to prevent peace and start a new war.

31 July 2024

Israel assassinates head of Hamas political bureau amid regional escalation.

31 July 2024

Netanyahu’s willing executioners: how ordinary Israelis became mass murderers.

31 July 2024

Gaza’s official death toll is a lie. The casualty numbers are far, far higher.

31 July 2024

Israeli lawmakers try to block torture prosecutions.

31 July 2024

AIPAC used distorted photo of Cori Bush in $7 million negative ad blitz.

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’?

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from October 2023 to end of February 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from March to end of May 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from August to end of October 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from November to the end of December 2024

October 07, 2023 – Palestine’s ‘Tet’? – from January to end of March 2025

More on Palestine

The war in the Ukraine – what you’re not told – 2024

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman

The World's Fair in Paris 1937

The World’s Fair in Paris 1937

More on the USSR

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman (Russian: Рабочий и колхозница) is a sculpture of two figures with a hammer and a sickle raised over their heads. The concept and compositional design belong to the architect Boris Iofan. It is 24.5 metres (78 feet) high, made from stainless steel by Vera Mukhina for the 1937 World’s Fair in Paris and subsequently moved to Moscow. The sculpture is an example of socialist realism in an Art Deco aesthetic. The worker holds aloft a hammer and the kolkhoz woman a sickle to form the hammer and sickle symbol.

The sculpture was originally created to crown the Soviet pavilion of the 1937 World’s Fair. The organisers had placed the Soviet and German pavilions facing each other across the main pedestrian boulevard at the Trocadéro on the north bank of the Seine.

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman - 01

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman – 01

Mukhina was inspired by her study of the classical Harmodius and Aristogeiton, the Winged Victory of Samothrace and La Marseillaise, François Rude’s sculptural group for the Arc de Triomphe, to bring a monumental composition of socialist realist confidence to the heart of Paris. The symbolism of the two figures striding from West to East, as determined by the layout of the pavilion, was also not lost on the spectators.

Mukhina said that her sculpture was intended ‘to continue the idea inherent in the building and this sculpture was to be an inseparable part of the whole structure but after the fair, the Rabochiy i Kolkhoznitsa was relocated to Moscow where it was placed just outside the All-Russia Exhibition Centre.

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman on the Main Gate of VDNKh

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman on the Main Gate of VDNKh

In 1941, the sculpture earned Mukhina one of the initial batch of Stalin Prizes.

The sculpture was removed for restoration in autumn of 2003 during the city’s Expo 2010 bid. The plan was that the sculpture could be back at its place by 2005, but this did not happen after the city lost the bidding process to Shanghai and many financial problems contributed to a delayed re-installation.

At the end of 2009 the monument returned to its place at VDNKh after 6 years of restorations. The revealing of the restored monument was held on the evening of December 4, 2009, accompanied by fireworks and a light show. The restored statue uses a new pavilion as pedestal, increasing its total height from 34.5 metres (the old pedestal was 10 metres tall) to 60 metres (the new pavilion is 34.5 metres tall plus the 24.5 metres of the statue itself).

Close up of the Kolkhoz Woman

Close up of the Kolkhoz Woman

The main structure of the monument was made at The Moscow factory of aggregate machine tools and automatic lines (called ‘Stankoagregat’) while the smaller components of the outer covering were created at the pilot plant of the Central Research Institute of Mechanical Engineering and Metalworking, overseen by Professor Pyotr Nikolayevich Lvov. He suggested using stainless chrome-nickel steel for the sculpture, despite initial doubts from Vera Mukhina and the rest of the team. The main reason steel was chosen over bronze and copper was because it had a better ability to reflect light. The goal was for the monument to shine brighter than the eagle on the German pavilion and the Eiffel Tower. Lvov invented resistance spot welding, a technique that was used to skin airplanes since the 1930s. Instead of using the traditional riveting method, the decision was made to use this technology for assembling the sculpture.

The Worker and Kolkhoz Woman in 1937

The Worker and Kolkhoz Woman in 1937

At the start of the project, the workers had four plaster models to use, with the tallest one being 95 cm. They assembled the monument in the factory courtyard using a crane that was 35 meters high with a 15-meter boom. The templates for the plating parts were made of wood, and the carpenters used 15 cm thick boards. The moulded parts were then shaped from inside the monument. People involved in the project remembered these details:

‘Working in February was particularly challenging due to the cold weather and strong winds. The only respite from the wind was inside the frame or ‘under the skirt of the Kolkhoznitsa’. To keep warm, we relied on a fire that was built in a cauldron dug into the ground. Additionally, we had to manually weld the sheathing sheets’.

Paris 1937

Paris 1937

A different approach was needed to create the hands and heads of the sculpture. Instead of using wooden templates, clay was used to fill in the damaged wooden blanks for the heads, which were then molded with steel. The creation of the scarf posed challenges, as it was a large and heavy piece that needed to be supported without external help. During the creation of this artwork, factory director S. P. Tambovtsev criticized Mukhina for causing delays with numerous revisions and claimed that the scarf she had designed could potentially damage the sculpture during windy weather. However, his complaints were ignored, and engineers B.A. Dzerzhkovich and A.A. Prikhozhan managed to create a truss to support the scarf, allowing it to appear as if it was floating behind two figures.

During this time period, the sculpture was created and it was supported by a heavy frame weighing 63 tons. The outer shells of the sculpture, made from thin sheets of 0.5 mm steel, only weighed 12 tons. The entire process took three and a half months. Once the sculpture was assembled, it was visited by a government commission led by Kliment Voroshilov, the People’s Commissar of Defence. Later that evening, Joseph Stalin, the leader of the USSR, inspected the finished monument. Shortly after, the sculpture was dismantled for transportation to Paris.

The USSR Pavilion in Paris in 1937

The USSR Pavilion in Paris in 1937

In 2003, plans were made to restore the monument, and it was supposed to be finished by 2005. The Moscow government provided a budget of 35 million roubles for the dismantling process, including 5 million US dollars for scaffolding to meet safety regulations. However, the project was put on hold due to suspected embezzlement, and it was not resumed until 2007 after several inspections.

On December 31, 2008, the government announced a new tender for the restoration with a maximum contract amount of 2.395 billion roubles. The only company to participate and win the tender that same day was SK Strategia, a subsidiary of Inteko owned by Yelena Baturina, the wife of former Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov. The contract amount was increased to 2.905 billion roubles. Finally, the restoration was completed in November 2009.

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman - 03

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman – 03

The sculpture project was led by Vadim Tserkovnikov and the materials were made by the Vladimir Kucherenko Central Research Institute of Steel Structures. The casting and installation were done at the Energomash plant in Belgorod. The Melnikov Central Research Institute of Steel Structures worked on new calculations and designs for the frame, as the original documentation was not available and the new materials have different properties. The employees at the All-Russian Institute Of Aviation Materials (VIAM), under the leadership of E.N. Kablov, developed coatings and materials that are highly resistant to corrosion in order to restore the sculpture.

The sculpture was taken apart into 40 pieces and each piece was photographed to assess the level of damage caused by corrosion. Only 10% of the pieces needed to be replaced completely, while the rest could be restored. Additionally, the welding points were examined through radiography, with over one million points being checked. The sculpture had design flaws that made it not airtight, resulting in moisture build up and pigeons nesting inside.

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman - 05

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman – 05

The second step in the reconstruction process involved cleaning the sculpture. The contaminants, particularly in the scarf and skirt areas, had accumulated over 70 years and resembled stalactites. Technobior developed a highly toxic and fluid substance to dissolve these contaminants and fully clean the surface. VIAM created an anti-corrosion paste specifically for the restoration of this sculpture, which won an award at an international exhibition. This paste can be applied at any angle, prevents spreading, enhances adhesion, and increases resistance to environmental damage. A ton of paste was used to treat the sculpture parts, and an additional protective compound was applied on top.

Under Tserkovnikov’s guidance, a new triple frame was calculated and designed for the monument. This frame is divided into a load-bearing frame, an intermediate frame, and a structural frame that connects the shell and load-bearing frame. As a result of the reconstruction, the weight of the support increased by 2.5 times to account for the load of hurricane wind. The total weight of the monument now stands at 200 tons. The sculpture was placed on the pavilion, following the general design of Iofan’s original project from 1937. The length of the building is 66 meters, and the original coat of arms created for the exhibition in 1937 is installed on the façade.

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman - 02

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman – 02

The monument was installed on November 28, 2009, using a specialized crane from Finland, of which there are only three in existence. The official unveiling of the monument occurred on December 4, 2009.

The total cost of dismantling, storing, and restoring the sculpture was 2.9 billion roubles. However, experts believe that this amount is at least twice as high as it should be. Vadim Tserkovnikov mentioned in an interview that the actual restoration expenses were much lower compared to the additional costs, such as constructing a 60-meter high scaffolding and hiring a crane from Finland, which cost several tens of millions of roubles.

The Worker and the Kolkhoz Woman – 04

In Soviet cinema, the sculpture was chosen in 1947 to serve as the logo for the film studio Mosfilm. It can be seen in the opening credits of the film Red Heat, as well as many of the Russian films released by the Mosfilm studio itself.

A giant moving reproduction of the statue was featured in the opening ceremony of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, symbolizing post-World War II Soviet society, particularly in Moscow.

Text above from Wikipedia.

The Worker and Kolkhoz Woman (meaning a worker on a collective or State farm) is one of the most iconic representations of Soviet Socialist Realism sculpture. And it played an ‘active’ role in the battle against the extreme manifestation of capitalism, the fascism of Nazi Germany which was nurtured and promoted by the so-called western ‘democracies’. In 1937 when fascism was rampant in various capitalist countries – and whilst the Spanish Civil War was raging on the Iberian Peninsular – the statue stood opposite the Nazi swastika and eagle in the area in front of the Eiffel Tower during the World’s Fair of that year. Two social systems confronted each other in a benign manner in 1937 but it was only one of them who would come out victorious in the real conflict which was the Battle of Stalingrad of 1942/43.

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman

Worker and Kolkhoz Woman

In its imagery it encompassed much of what the Soviet Union, in the construction of Socialism, was aiming to achieve; equality between men and women; both on an equal footing in the construction of a new society; the unity of the industrial worker and the worker on the land; marching determinedly forward to a new future, devoid of exploitation and oppression; a future free of militarism; a future where labour was respected as being the creator of all wealth and where those who created that wealth were able to enjoy the fruits of their labour without it being stolen by a parasitic and avaricious capitalist class; and the choice of stainless steel in its construction being able to outshine anything that fascism or capitalism could produce.

I had seen pictures the sculpture and had also seen scaled models in various museums before going to the Exhibition of Achievements of National Economy, VDNKh, but nothing really prepared me for the sheer size of the sculpture in real life. Even standing on the pedestal of the reconstructed building from the 1937 World’s Fair it looked immense.

And the efforts to return it to its former glory, although taking many years (due to political and economic reasons) and costing possibly more than it should have (due to funds going to those not deserving) the results are truly impressive.

The Sculptor

Vera Mukhina

Vera Mukhina

Vera Mukhina (1889-1953)

Vera Mukhina was a teacher and artist working in easel, monumental, monumental-decorative and memorial sculpture, in theatrical design and applied art. She also wrote articles on contemporary art and sculpture. She studied at the private art schools of Konstantin Yuon (1909-11), Nina Sinitsina (1911) and Ilya Mashkov (1911-12) in Moscow, and at private establishments in Paris (the Academies Colarossi, de La Palette and de la Grande Chaurniere, 1912-14). Lessons from Antoine Bourdelle were especially important for Mukhina’s development as an artist. She was also influenced by Cubism, which was particularly noticeable in her early drawings. In the 1920s she played an active part in the implementation of the plan for Monumental Propaganda. Her best efforts in that field were a design for The Flame of the Revolution (1922-23) and a monument to the Revolution for the town of Klin (1919). From 1926-30 she taught at the VKhUTEIN (Higher State Art and Technical Institute) in Moscow. The chief result of her tireless search for a synthesis of monumental sculpture and architecture was Worker and Kolkhoz Woman for the Soviet pavilion at the Paris Exposition of 1937. With this work she won world fame and became arguably the most popular symbol of the Soviet state. Among her designs for monuments that were executed are those to Maxim Gorky (1952) and Pyotr Tchaikovsky (1954), both in Moscow. In the 1930s-40s she produced an extensive gallery of portraits of contemporaries, as well as a large number of designs for monuments and monumental-decorative sculptures that never came to fruition. Mukhina contributed to the revival of the production of artistic glass. Through her efforts a glass factory was established in Leningrad in the late 1930s that went on to become one of the foremost in the country.

From Soviet Women and their Art, Rena Lavery and Ivan Lindsay, Unicorn, London, 2019.

Location;

Now on a reconstructed building of the original at the 1937 Paris Exhibition which is just outside the main VDNKh exhibition area in Moscow.

How to get there;

The site is served by the VDNKh metro station, on Line 6, the brown one.

More on the USSR

Park Pobeda – Victory Park – exhibition and museum, Moscow

Museum of the Great Patriotic War

Museum of the Great Patriotic War

More on the USSR

Park Pobeda – Victory Park – exhibition and museum, Moscow

‘Trophies of the Russian Army’ and the Museum of the Great Patriotic War

‘Trophies of the Russian Army’

On May 1st 2024 a temporary exhibition was open at Park Pobeda (Victory Park) in Moscow. This was entitled ‘Trophies of the Russian Army’ and consisted of vehicles of various types and other war equipment captured by the Russian Army in the Ukraine. The main body of the exhibition was a variety of armoured vehicles – tanks, armoured personnel vehicles (APVs), and other forms of transportation, from various countries in the NATO alliance against Russia and its Special Military Operation in the Ukraine.

As has been documented on this blog on the page The war in the Ukraine – what you are not told, many of these weapons were introduced onto the battle field as ‘game changers’ – weapons that would be so powerful (as they were produced in the ‘west’ and hence superior to anything that could be produced in Russia) that they would just steam roller over any Russian defences and thereby assist in the Ukrainians recovering territory lost to the Russian Army since February 2022.

However, things did not go to plan.

German Leopard Tank

German Leopard Tank

Although there has been a blame game going on between the Ukraine and the NATO commanders (and politicians) what has been obvious is that the west believed too much in their own propaganda and came a cropper due to their own hubris. Whereas the military-industrial complex in the various NATO countries were hoping that the overwhelming victory their equipment would deliver against the Russians would be the finest advert possible to sell their wares in other parts of the world, it merely showed that western military equipment is too complicated; which means it takes too long to make in vast numbers and hence not ideal in a conflict of attrition (which the war in the Ukraine has become); and far too expensive.

However, instead of participating in victory parades the US Abrams and German Leopard tanks were filmed burning on the steppes of the Ukraine. The UK Challenger 2 tanks, once one or two had been destroyed, just ran away and acted as artillery far from the front – where such main battle tanks are designed to operate. An Abrams and a Leopard were on display in the exhibition.

American Abrams Tank

American Abrams Tank

In a covered enclosure there were also on display communication and GPS equipment, drones, mortars, small arms and other kinds of small military equipment.

I understood the original plan was for this to be a short term exhibition, finishing the weekend after Victory Day which was celebrated on May 9th. However, the exhibition attracted streams of Moscovites and there was a constant flow of people (many thousands in a day) so it was decided to extend the display.

For how long I have no idea and don’t know if there are plans to place some of this material in a permanent exhibition somewhere in Moscow or another major city. The plan might be, as far as I’m concerned, to take this exhibition around to other major Russian cities.

Hopefully, the slide show below will provide a flavour of what was on display for those who are unable to attend in person.

The Museum of the Great Patriotic War

This is a huge building which is approached by a wide avenue which commemorates the major battle fields in the war against the invading German Nazis and their accomplices in crime. It was opened in 1995 and I don’t understand why such a museum hadn’t been constructed decades before. Being constructed in a time of open capitalist control of the society the decoration inside or outside of the building owes nothing to Socialist Realist ideas.

In fact, it’s not really appropriate to call it a museum as it is more of a shrine and memorial to those who were killed in the Great Patriotic War and a place of ‘pilgrimage’ for military associated groups to come and pay respects.

Museum of the Great Patriotic War - 02

Museum of the Great Patriotic War – 02

There’s very little in terms of artefacts (as, for example, you will find in the Battle of Stalingrad Museum in Volgograd) and the vast space is not used, as far as I’m concerned, in an appropriate way to tell the story of some of the most significant battles of the Second World War. I think this is probably the result of the schizophrenic approach the present ‘rulers’ have towards the war against the Nazis. They recognise that it as a Socialist Red Army that defeated the attacking Germans but they don’t want to give (or didn’t in the 1990s) too much prominence to that fact. With the conflict with NATO – through its proxy of the Ukraine – thinking has changed and that was the reason you saw so much reference to Soviet symbolism in the posters and imagery in the build up to May 9th, Victory Day, 2024.

Museum of the Great Patriotic War - 01

Museum of the Great Patriotic War – 01

Also, very strangely for a ‘museum’ there was a room with references to the Special Military Operation in the Ukraine. This was in the form of portraits and photographs of soldiers on active duty. There was also a sculpture of a platoon moving forward on a battle front. I can see why this room was created, the war in the Ukraine is one of propaganda as well as what happens in the field, but placing such a room in a museum which commemorates battles on a much bigger scale where the forces concerned were not only hugely greater in number but also much more fiercely fought seems, to me, to detract from the importance and sacrifice of the war between 1941 and 1945.

Museum of the Great Patriotic War - 03

Museum of the Great Patriotic War – 03

In the slide show there are a few pictures which will, hopefully, give an impression of what the ‘museum’ is all about.

On my visit I didn’t make it to the Museum of the Main Weapons Relics of the Army, which might have been a shame. Entrance for that also costs 300 rouble.

Location;

10 Brothers Fonchenko Street

How to get there;

The Park Pobeda Metro station is right at the entrance to the park. It’s west of the city centre on Line No 3, the dark blue line.

GPS;

55°43′50″N

37°30′14″E

Opening times;

Wednesday-Sunday, 10.00 – 22.00

Tuesday, 13.00 – 22.00

Monday, closed

Entrance;

300 rouble.

Website;

https://victorymuseum.ru/for-visitors/museum-for-china/en/

More on the USSR