The first capitulation of Tsipras and Varoufakis (Part 8)

by Eric Toussaint

At the end of January 2025, the main leader of Syriza, Alexis Tsipras, became Prime Minister and appointed Yanis Varoufakis, a left-wing economist close to his party, as Finance Minister. It is very important to take the time to analyse the policies put in place by Yanis Varoufakis and the Syriza government because, for the first time in the 21^st century, a radical left-wing party was elected in Europe to form a government. Less than six months later, the government finally gave in to the demands of the creditors against the wishes of the Greek people as expressed in the referendum of 5 July 2015. Understanding the failures and drawing lessons from the Syriza government’s handling of the problems are two essential questions. Éric Toussaint shows that it was possible to implement a different policy in line with Syriza’s commitments to the Greek people.

1. Greece 2015 | From hope to capitulation | Lessons for the future [Part 1]
2. Greece 2015: Varoufakis’ proposals were doomed to fail [Part 2]
3. A questionable account by Varoufakis of the origins of the Greek crisis [Part 3]
4. How Tsipras and Varoufakis’s turned their backs on Syriza’s platform [Part 4]
5. Greece 2015: Varoufakis’s Advisers [Part 5]
6. A Negotiation Strategy Doomed to Fail [Part 6]
7. Towards the first capitulation and the disastrous 20 February 2015 agreement with the Eurogroup [Part 7]
8. The first capitulation of Tsipras and Varoufakis (Part 8)

How Tsipras and Varoufakis’s turned their backs on Syriza’s platform

by Eric Toussaint

Yanis Varoufakis traces his collaboration with Alexis Tsipras and his alter ego, Nikos Pappas, back to 2011. That collaboration gradually broadened, starting with 2013, to include Yannis Dragasakis. There is a constant in the relations between Varoufakis and Tsipras: Varoufakis constantly argues for changes in the political programme that Syriza had adopted. Varoufakis tells us that Tsipras–Pappas–Dragasakis themselves clearly wanted to move toward an orientation that was different from, and significantly more moderate than, the one their party had adopted.

Varoufakis’s narrative is lively and piquant. Through it, we see how choices were made behind Syriza’s back at very important stages, without regard for basic democratic principles.

To hear Varoufakis tell it, he played a central role, and he did in fact exert influence on the line the Tsipras–Pappas–Dragasakis trio adopted. It’s also certain that Tsipras and Pappas, outside of Syriza, sought to create fairly close relations with certain individuals and institutions in order to gradually move the policies put into practice farther and farther away from the positions Syriza had championed. Varoufakis is not the only person they contacted, but at a given point Tsipras and Pappas felt that he was the right man to negotiate with the European institutions and the IMF.

Greece in 2015 :

A questionable account by Varoufakis of the origins of the Greek crisis

by Eric Toussaint

In the previous article entitled ‘Greece 2015: Varoufakis’ proposals were doomed to fail’, I critically analysed the proposals made by Varoufakis before joining Tsipras’ government in January 2015, showing that they led to failure. This article covers the ties Varoufakis maintained with Greece’s ruling political class (both the Pasok, historically linked to social-democracy, and the conservative New Democracy) for several years.

On several occasions, Varoufakis mentions the broad range of his relations with members of the Greek political milieu. He stresses his past friendship with Yanis Stournaras (the current governor of the Bank of Greece, an ally of Mario Draghi and of the private Greek and foreign bankers), his good relations in 2009 with George Papandreou (who implemented the policies leading to the first Memorandum of Understanding in May 2010) and his relationship with Antonis Samaras (who led the Greek government after the second Memorandum of Understanding), and he devotes a large part of the first four chapters of his book to relating how a close collaboration, and at times a complicity, was formed with three Syriza leaders. Those leaders were Alexis Tsipras (who led the Greek people into the third Memorandum of Understanding) and Nikos Pappas (Tsipras’s alter ego, who became a minister of state in the first Tsipras government), who were joined later by Yannis Dragasakis (before he became vice–prime minister of the first and second Tsipras governments). In this second chapter I will deal with Varoufakis’s account of the start of the crisis in Greece and his relations with Greece’s traditional political class.

Greece 2015: Varoufakis’ proposals were doomed to fail

by Eric Toussaint

In his book Adults in the Room [1], Yanis Varoufakis gives his version of the events that led to the shameful capitulation of the government of Alexis Tsipras in July 2015. Essentially it analyses the period 2009–2015, though it makes incursions into earlier periods.

With this voluminous (550-page) work, Yanis Varoufakis shows that he is a gifted storyteller. At times he succeeds in moving the reader. His direct and vivid style makes it easy to follow events.
This initial chapter will cover the first four chapters of a book that comprises seventeen in all. It deals with the proposals Varoufakis made before he became a member of the government in January 2015.

 Series Understanding what happened in Greece in 2015 when hope came from Athens

Greece 2015 | From hope to capitulation | Lessons for the future

by ERIC TOUSSAINT

25 January 2015, at a time when Greece had been suffering since 2010 under the burden of a severe austerity regime forced on the country by its creditors and by the social-democrat (Pasok) and conservative (New Democracy) parties who have taken turns exercising power in the country, Syriza (an acronym whose Greek meaning is “coalition of the radical Left”) won the legislative elections in Greece, with 149 deputies out of a total 300. Lacking an absolute majority in the Hellenic Parliament, Syriza formed a coalition government with ANEL (a small “souverainist” right-wing organization which announced that like Syriza, its priority was to put an end to the austerity policies). Syriza’s leader, Alexis Tsipras, became prime minister and appointed Yanis Varoufakis, a left-leaning economist close to Syriza, his finance minister.

‘Trump likes what Putin does,’ Bernie Sanders says in Kyiv Independent

As Ukraine enters the fourth year of Russia’s full-scale invasion, shifting political dynamics in the U.S. threaten to influence the course of the war. U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly misrepresented the war’s origins, excluded Ukraine from initial negotiations, and advocated for what many see as an exploitative deal that would force Ukraine to surrender national resources as “repayment” for U.S. aid.

Trump’s rhetoric raises urgent questions about America’s long-term commitment to aiding Ukraine.

In an interview with the Kyiv Independent, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders shares his concerns about Trump’s growing alignment with Russia and other authoritarian regimes, what a possible U.S.-Russia alliance would mean for the American people, the role of billionaires like Elon Musk in shaping both domestic and international political discourse, and why defending Ukraine is crucial for the future of global democracy.

How Would Israel Respond if Trump Called for Death Camps in Gaza?

by LEVY Gideon

And what if U.S. President Donald Trump suggested setting up death camps for the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip? What would happen then? Israel would respond exactly as it did to his transfer ideas, with ecstasy on the right and indifference in the centrist camp.

Yair Lapid would announce that he would go to Washington to present a “complementary plan,” like he offered to do with regard to the transfer plan. Benny Gantz would say that the plan shows “creative thinking, is original and interesting.” Bezalel Smotrich, with his messianic frame of mind, would say, “God has done wonders for us and we rejoice.” Benjamin Netanyahu would rise in public opinion polls.

Two Myths About the Gaza Ceasefire

by Gilbert ACHCAR

There are two conspicuous myths about the Gaza ceasefire that went into effect last Sunday: that it was due to Trump’s pressure on Netanyahu and that it was a victory achieved by Hamas.

There are two conspicuous myths about the Gaza ceasefire that went into effect last Sunday. The first myth attributes the agreement to pressure from Donald Trump, who had expressed his desire to have it done before he took office, and even threatened to bring “hell” (as if what the people of Gaza had experienced for 471 days had not been hell) if the ceasefire did not happen on the desired date. Of course, Trump’s team exerted real pressure to reach a truce (which is the appropriate name of what started on Sunday), but the myth is in portraying this pressure as consisting in twisting Netanyahu’s arm, to the point that Trump got depicted by various sources as a hero who would achieve a just peace for the Palestinian people.

Interview With Palestinian-Ukrainian Analyst Rita Adel: “There Is Trauma on Both Sides of My Family but Historically They Don’t Meet”

Since October 7th, there have been a number of interviews and articles regarding Israelis of Ukrainian descent. However, the voices of Ukrainians of Palestinian descent are noticeably absent from the dominant Ukrainian news. 

We spoke with Rita Adel about her ongoing effort to navigate trauma and obstacles on both sides of her family. With the start of the full-scale invasion, Rita started to reflect on her positionality as both of Ukrainian and Palestinian origins. She actively advocates for arming Ukraine and boycotting Israel and addresses double standards concerning Ukraine and Palestine. With her activism, Rita Adel establishes sustainable networks of solidarity between her homelands. 

What are your ties to Ukraine and Palestine? 

I am both Ukrainian and Jordanian of Palestinian origin. My mom is from Ukraine and my dad is a Palestinian-Jordanian. And there are a lot of people like me that come from this particular mix of heritage because many people studied in the former USSR. This is how my parents met. So I was born and raised in Ukraine, and then we moved to Jordan in 2003: I remember this date very well because it was the year when there was war in Iraq. So basically, both countries are my homeland. But all my childhood memories and growing up are related to Ukraine - it's my home. 

How the Abandonment of Democracy and Internationalism Has Decimated the Socialist Movement

by Rohini Hensman*

This paper looks not at workers’ struggles, which had their ups and downs over the last two hundred years, but specifically at the revolutionary socialist movement, which aims to eliminate capitalism. While there have been contributions to the vision of a classless, stateless society by utopian socialists and anarchists, the paper concentrates on Karl Marx and Frederick Engels and their legacy. It identifies three bifurcation points in this particular revolutionary socialist tradition where a substantial part of the movement abandoned democracy, internationalism, or both, and argues that this has had a disastrous effect on the movement and needs to be reversed.

The New Zionist Ideal: A Generation of Israelis Devoid of Shame Over the Gaza War

by Gideon Levy

Yair Weigler, an educator and CEO of an organization called "Teachers for Change," has just returned from a lengthy stint in the reserves.

"We saw action in various neighborhoods and refugee camps in the Gaza Strip, as well as spending some time on its beaches, followed by action in Lebanon … we were settlers, Tel Avivians, people evacuated from the [Gaza Strip's] Katif Bloc in 2005; we were brothers in arms, people in education and in high-tech … one tank company," he said poetically, as if he were a young man returning from a post-army trip overseas, singing the praises of locations he had visited. Oh, Shujaiyeh, oh, what unity. What an army, what a people.

How Israel Won the West | The Big Picture

How Israel Won the West examines how Israel has come to occupy such a privileged and protected place in the Western world. It traces the journey of the Jewish people from biblical stories of origin through centuries of persecution and the advent of Zionism, all the way to the creation of Israel and its ensuing occupation of the Palestinian territory. Along the way, what is revealed is a process of transformation, of how Jews went from being despised by early Christians as "Christ killers" – seeding a vile anti-Judaism that would mutate into anti-Semitism – to being considered part of the white Western world, sharing a common Judeo-Christian heritage.

Pro-Trump “socialists” channel the history of “Third Period Communism”

By oaklandsocialist on October 16, 2024

“We have the power to take an historic stand and defeat this war mongering Senator Harris…. To win this election [the Democrats] need this city [Dearborn], they need this state [Michigan]. We need to deny them those votes….” (cheers and applause.) So spoke “socialist” leader Kshama Sawant in a speech on Oct. 6 for her fellow “left” Trump/Putin supporter Jill Stein. Sawant’s statement received general applause.

Hamas, “Al-Aqsa Flood”, the West and the Holocaust: A Conversation

by ACHCAR Gilbert, Megaphone (Beirut)

The rising wave of condemnation of Israel’s genocidal war and solidarity with the Palestinian people has occurred despite Al-Aqsa Flood rather than thanks to it.

Megaphone - 1. Al-Aqsa Flood brought “the question of Palestine” back to the centre of world’s attention and exposed the bias inherent in the official and institutional “Western” position, which not only supported Israel, but also sacrificed values, such as journalistic objectivity, freedom of opinion, and others, in order to protect the Israeli government’s narrative, even when the latter was crumbling. By “Western” position here, we do not mean all Western countries, nor do we mean that there is one position without internal objection or different iterations. Rather, we mean a position that defined itself as “Western” and justified its limitations in this light. How can media and cultural attitudes towards the current genocide be assessed and explained? Were there any shifts in these attitudes from last year until now?

Investigating war crimes in Gaza | Al Jazeera Investigations

3 oct. 2024

This feature length investigation by Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit exposes Israeli war crimes in the Gaza Strip through the medium of photos and videos posted online by Israeli soldiers themselves during the year long conflict. The I-Unit has built up a database of thousands of videos, photos and social media posts. Where possible it has identified the posters and those who appear. The material reveals a range of illegal activities, from wanton destruction and looting to the demolition of entire neighbourhoods and murder. The film also tells the story of the war through the eyes of Palestinian journalists, human rights workers and ordinary residents of the Gaza Strip. And it exposes the complicity of Western governments – in particular the use of RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus as a base for British surveillance flights over Gaza. “The west cannot hide, they cannot claim ignorance. Nobody can say they didn’t know,” says Palestinian writer, Susan Abulhawa.This is “the first livestream genocide in history … If people are ignorant they are wilfully ignorant,” she says.