Building Solidarity in 2025: Bernard Regan, Palestine Solidarity Campaign

By Bryn Griffiths

The first episode of the Labour Left Podcast in 2025 takes a deep dive into the subject of Gaza with Bernard Regan of the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign.  We ask the big question: how do we build the broadest possible solidarity with the Palestinian people in 2025? We could not be asking the question at a better time as the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign AGM takes place on Saturday 1st February.

As we publish this episode, it is good news to learn that, at last, we have a ceasefire in Gaza.  Donald Trump is seeking to make the ceasefire about himself and is claiming all the credit. However, Trump is already telling us that he’s not confident that the ceasefire will hold! We will find out the truth in the coming weeks.  What is absolutely certain is that in 2025 we must continue our support for the Palestinian people and to do that we need to deepen our understanding of their struggle.  We must also redouble our solidarity activities in 2025.  That is the subject matter of this podcast. Listen to it and use it. 

Our guest on the Labour Hub podcast spin-off, to consider the tasks ahead, is Bernard Regan a leading member of the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign.  Bernard served for twenty-five years on the National Executive Committee of the National Education Union (NEU) where he received the Steve Sinnott Award in recognition of his contribution to international solidarity.  In 2006 he was instrumental in a teachers’ union pro-Palestinian motion which carried the TUC.

We all know that the current crisis in Gaza did not begin on 7th October 2023, so we start by considering the long history of the Palestinian struggle. To do this we spoke about Bernard’s excellent book The Balfour Declaration – Empire, the Mandate and Resistance in Palestine.

To set the solidarity tasks ahead, we need to understand Israel’s role in the Middle East.  So, the podcast considers why to this day the United States cares so much about Israel and why Keir Starmer and David Lammy are so firmly wedded to their pro-Israel stance.

In the second half, we consider what we must do against the current backdrop of the terrible Hamas massacre?  As Trump takes office, we ask what we can do to support the Palestinians?  How can we broaden the international campaign and at home how can we put as much pressure as possible on Keir Starmer’s Labour Government? Bernard answers these fundamental questions against the backdrop of a British Government that is becoming increasingly authoritarian in its response to Palestinian protests.

Since the last episode the Labour Left Podcast has had some generous coverage in the Morning Star.  The newspaper published a feature on the show by the journalist Solomon Hughes under the hilarious title In a sea of centrist dross, try the Labour Left Podcast. Solomon went on to say “It’s a podcast which manages to combine the grit of the grassroots with the surprising, entertaining and informative.” Thanks to Solomon.

If you’re new to the Labour Left Podcast, please take a look at our back catalogue.  Previous episodes have included Prof Harvey J Kaye on the legacy of the Communist Historians; Prof Corinne Fowler, talking about her book Our Island Stories: Country Walks Through Colonial Britain; Andrew Fisher telling the story behind For the Many Not the Few, Labour’s 2017 manifesto; Jeremy Gilbert, a Professor of Cultural and Political Theory, a champion of Gramsci, talking about Thatcherism; episodes with Mish Rahman, Rachel Godfrey Wood and Hilary Schan on the contemporary Labour left; Mike Phipps, author of Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow, taking a long-term look at the Labour Left;  Mike Jackson, co-founder of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners, on the Great 1984-85 Miners’ Strike; political activist Liz Davies telling her story as the dissenter within Blair’s New Labour; Rachel Garnham, a current co-Chair of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy looking back at the history of the fight for democracy in the British Labour Party; and finally myself telling the story of Brighton Labour Briefing, a local Bennite magazine of the 1980s.

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Bryn Griffiths is an activist in Colchester Labour Party and North Essex World Transformed. He is the Vice-Chair of Momentum and sits on the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy’s Executive. 

Bryn hosts Labour Hub’s spin-off – the Labour Left Podcast.  You can find all the episodes of the podcast here  or if you prefer audio platforms (for example Amazon, Audible Spotify, Apple etc.,) go to your favourite podcast provider and just search for the Labour Left Podcast.