Don't scab for the bosses
Don't listen to their lies
Us, poor folks, haven't got a chance
Unless we organize
Which side are you on?
Which side are you on?
May Day 2025 marks 572 days of the ongoing genocide in Gaza, on top of 77 years of the ongoing Nakba and two months since Israel once again closed the border, blocking essential humanitarian aid from entering Gaza. The latter has resulted in an imposed famine with over 2.2 million Palestinians currently facing food insecurity.
On International Workers’ Day, we invite comrades to double down on concrete, material solidarity with our trade union siblings in Palestine. Last month, TUED and the BDS Movement held a joint Workshop on “Trade Unions for the Global Energy Embargo for Palestine” to leverage the strategic power that energy workers have in cutting fuel supplies to Israel. Building on this work, this week’s Bulletin shares May Day materials and solidarity resources.
The following statement by Palestinian trade unions calls on workers and unions to escalate their support to end the genocide and dismantle Israel's colonial apartheid regime. Read the complete statement here.
Israel is only able to continue its livestreamed genocide against Palestinians, including daily massacres, burning our children, men and women alive, or starving and thirsting them to death, due to the ongoing complicity of states, companies and institutions around the world. On this May Day, a historic day for the international labor movement that commemorates the struggles of workers for dignity and justice, as Palestinian trade and professional unions, we urgently renew our call to unions around the world to escalate all effort to end this shameful complicity in Israel’s illegal occupation, colonial apartheid and genocide.
Our 2.3 million sisters and brothers in Gaza who have survived this genocide and who continue to resist it, and the entire Palestinian people resisting brutal military aggression, land theft, the destruction of entire communities, settler-colonial apartheid and occupation everywhere are counting on your meaningful solidarity actions, not just rhetorical support.
May 1st is a day of internationalist solidarity, where we remind ourselves that an injury to one is an injury to all. The US-Israeli genocide and global complicity have not only exterminated tens of thousands of Palestinians and continue to kill Palestinian workers merely for continuing to do their jobs as medical personnel, journalists, rescue workers, and humanitarian workers. They have also hastened the onslaught of a “might makes right” era. This has manifested itself in the collapse of respect for international law, human rights and workers’ rights. This affects us all and therefore should unite us all. Our struggle for justice in Palestine is inseparable from the global struggle against systemic racism, exploitation and oppression.
The 2024 decisions of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) – that Israel is plausibly committing genocide, that its occupation is illegal, and its policies amount to apartheid – make ending all complicity in Israel’s crimes and imposing targeted, lawful sanctions, including a two-way military embargo, not only a moral but also a legal obligation for states and corporations. The same applies to all unions.
It is the duty of unions to ensure that the workers they represent—whether in ports, on ships, in businesses, or in government offices—are not involved, often without their knowledge and/or consent, in actions that involve complicity in genocide, apartheid, and Israel's illegal occupation.
We urge unions and workers worldwide to translate solidarity into serious pressure campaigns on governments, corporations, and institutions to comply with their obligations under international law by ending all complicity in Israel’s colonial oppression.
[Continue reading the full statement here.]
The United Auto Workers’ Brandon Mancilla explains why his union has continued to oppose the genocide in Gaza, why slaughter abroad is tied to workers’ decline in living standards at home, and the union’s pushback to Donald Trump’s war on higher education. Read the complete interview by Sumaya Awad here and a brief segment below.
Brandon Mancilla: Signing on to a cease-fire and also an arms embargo is not something that faced huge opposition within the union. In fact, most people understood it, because they saw what was happening in the news and were horrified. Most working-class people do not want their money going to foreign wars. They don’t want to be complicit in something as horrific as the genocide in Gaza. They want to stand on the right side. That’s not a universal position, but I think most people have an instinct to be antiwar and anti-atrocity. I have faith in people on that level.
Most people that I’ve met at UAW conferences and different UAW events have said that endorsing a cease-fire was the right decision. I’m proud of my union for taking a bold stance in keeping with the social justice and internationalist commitment of the union, from the days of opposing apartheid South Africa and supporting the civil rights movement. UAW members are really proud of that history.
[Read the complete interview here.]
While commuting to your local May Day actions, tune into TUED Radio and listen to Episodes 8 and 9 on working-class struggles for a Public Pathway in Europe and Uruguay.
Episode 9 | Reflecting on the New European Clean Industrial Deal with EPSU's Tuscany Bell [ENGLISH]
The labour movement is often excluded because it demands enforceable conditions, redistributive measures, & democratic oversight. EPSU demands an alternative industrial policy, one grounded in public ownership, worker protections, & global solidarity.
In this episode, TUED reflects on Europe’s Clean Industrial Deal and its implications for workers, public services, and global equity with guest Tuscany Bell, Policy Lead for Utilities at the European Public Service Union (EPSU). Bell unpacks the shortcomings of the 2019 European Green Deal and assesses the risks posed by its successor.
Tuscany explores why the Green Deal fell short as an industrial strategy, despite binding climate targets, and what a public-led, democratically shaped industrial policy could look like.
Uruguay’s state-owned energy company is outstanding by most standards. Why did a progressive administration prefer to work with private sector renewable energy developers instead of its robust public company and, in effect, privatise a significant part of its energy sector?
This episode analyses the 10-15 years since the energy transition took off with guest Gonzalo Castelgrande, President of the AUTE union in Uruguay.
Castelgrande explains the consequences that the privatisation of energy has had on the working class and summarises the current state of the energy system. Castelgrande breaks down how the UTE public company in charge of guaranteeing electric power to all of Uruguay, works and AUTE’s strategy for a Public Pathway to reclaim and restore Uruguay’s energy in the years to come.
The Valley Labor Report is the only union talk radio show in Alabama, elevating struggles for justice and fairness on the job.
This episode interviews TUED on the efforts of the TUED South platform to strengthen Global South trade union coordination for a Public Pathway.
Solidarity Forever.
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