The text below is a message shared by our comrade Savas Michael-Matsas on Facebook concerning the loss of a very dear friend and an invaluable comrade of the International Socialist Center Christian Rakovsky, Jeremy Lester of Scotland and Italy. Jeremy talked this past 21 January on Palestine and his experience there in the Special Session on Palestine within the framework of the Conference on the Centenary of Lenin’s death. We will come back to commemorate the memory of Jeremy, but we wish to make all his friends and comrades aware of this tragic loss as early as possible.
Last Tuesday, September the 10th, we lost our very close friend for three decades, our Comrade Jeremy Lester. He was Professor of political science in Reading University(UK), an inspired writer of literature and theater, above all a fighter for the liberation of the oppressed, an internationalist communist, a dedicated supporter of the EEK. In December 2023-January 2024 Jeremy was in the West Bank making art therapy to Palestinian children. He brought to Europe their paintings about how they see their lives today during a genocidal war and how they dream Palestine in 2048, a hundred years. from Nakba. The exposition of the paintings in Bologna in Italy and in Sardegna were a great success. Now the same exposition traveled to Glasgow, Scotland, to come later to Athens. Despite his poor and deteriorating health conditions Jeremy traveled to Glasgow for the inauguration of the exposition of the Palestinian children’s paintings. He collapsed and soon he died at the hospital. We share our deep sorrow with and send our solidarity to his companion, comrade Gemma.
The photo is from one of our last meetings in Paris in 2023, near the place where Trotsky lived in 1916, before going to Russia in 1917, to the beginning of the world socialist revolution.
Hasta la victoria siempre compañero Jeremy!