On March 26 the left-progressive newspaper, Green Left reported that two weeks earlier, Meta, the giant social media corporation, unpublished Green Left’s longstanding Facebook page.

Green Left has been banned for ten years!

Below is a message that the Red Ant Editorial Collective communicated to the Green Left editor expressing solidarity in its struggle against the repressive move and suggesting a united front response to it.

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Red Ant deplores and denounces the banning of the Green Left Facebook account.

The ten year long ban on the Green Left Facebook page is an outrageous assault on the democratic rights of all progressive organisations and must be reversed.

What Facebook has taken exception to is the posting of an image and an interview with the great leader of the Palestinian liberation movement, Leila Khalid.

There is nothing in Australian law that restricts the distribution of either images or interviews with Leila Khalid or the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine of which she is a leading member.

Facebook presents itself as a sort of electronic “public square” in which participants can proclaim whatever interests them.

However, Meta, the parent company actually relates to what is posted as a resource to be mined for sale to advertisers.

It is this contradiction between the public right to free speech and the private ownership of Facebook that allows Meta to get away with its censorship.

This censorship is yet another indicator of the creeping McCarthyism that is accompanying the Israeli genocide in Gaza in particular and the US imperialist war drive against the developing world in general, especially China.

War requires social discipline and repression of dissenting views is the beginning of it.

All Australian left and progressive organisations, including political parties, trade unions, progressive religious groups and activist organisations should join together to fight this instance of repression.

What affects Green Left today will crush us all tomorrow if we allow it to pass unhindered.

To this end we suggest a joint statement be produced around which a united front of progressive organisations can begin to form and develop campaigning strategies to fight this ban and prepare for future united activities in defence of civil liberties.