A joint statement by the International Socialist League, the International Trotskyist Opposition, and the League for the Fifth International
1. October 7 marks one year since Hamas invaded border defenses in southern Israel, attacked military targets, took hostages—mostly civilians—and returned to its bases. The operation took Israel by surprise, shattered the myth of its invulnerability and paralyzed the process of ‘normalization’ of its relations with the complicit Arab states sponsored by US imperialism. The pain over the death and mistreatment of unarmed civilians cannot hide the fact that the essential party responsible for the violence is the Zionist and colonialist state, which has committed ethnic cleansing and genocide against the Palestinian people since the end of the first world war, in 1918, under the protection of the British imperialism, with a dramatic jump when the Israely State was founded in 1948, 76 years ago.
2. In retaliation for Hamas’s actions, the Israel Defense Forces have relaunched a brutal war against Palestine, especially in the Gaza Strip. The relentless bombing of homes, hospitals, schools, bakeries and refugee camps; the cutting off of water, electricity and internet; and the blocking of international humanitarian and health aid have so far caused more than 200,000 Palestinian deaths, 41,000 of them from bullets and bombs, tens of thousands more from malnutrition and lack of medicines—mostly women and children—some 10,000 under the rubble, 95,000 injured, nearly two million displaced and the destruction of all basic infrastructure. On top of this massacre, Zionist troops and settlers attack Palestinian residents in the occupied West Bank.
3. In the last week, the State of Israel has multiplied its attacks on Lebanon. First it detonated thousands of beepers and then it unleashed bombings against civilians in the south, thus opening up the possibility of an escalation of war throughout the Middle East. So far, its offensive has caused hundreds of deaths, thousands of injuries and a massive displacement from southern Lebanon and the areas of Baalbek, Bekaa and Hermel towards Beirut, the capital. It is the largest attack on that country since the Zionist occupation in 1982, an aggression that Israel now intends to repeat. The assassination of Nasrallah and the invasion of southern Lebanon is turning into an all-out war against Hezbollah and the entire Lebanese people. At the same time, as a result of the Lebanese economic collapse, the capacity of hospitals and humanitarian aid institutions is exhausted.
4. During the past year, Israel’s attacks and armed operations have also reached Syria, Yemen and Iran, always with the economic, political and military support of the United States, Western imperialism and their governments. Israel also has the explicit or implicit complicity of the new imperialisms of Russia and China and of the majority of the capitalist governments of the Arab countries. Beyond their anti-Israel rhetoric, the reactionary and theocratic Iranian regime has not supported the Palestinian resistance in practice in accordance with its expectations. At the same time, the greatest threat to the possibility of genuine peace in the region is Zionist-imperialist oppression.
5. Despite the enormous disparity of forces and the massacres, Israel has still not managed to overcome the Palestinian resistance, dismantle Hamas or recover the hostages. At the same time, in the main imperialist countries, the Arab world and globally, with the youth at the vanguard, there are massive demonstrations, encampments and other actions in solidarity with Palestine and boycotting Zionist interests that expose Israel’s criminal role. Activists challenge the repression and persecution of complicit governments. This growing rejection has pressured the International Criminal Court and UN agencies to issue resolutions condemning Israel, demanding a ceasefire, the arrival of humanitarian aid and an end to the occupation of new territories. But they limit themselves to formal declarations, without effective sanctions. The only decisive tool for victory remains Palestinian resistance and the active solidarity of the Arab peoples and the entire world.
6. The far-right government of Netanyahu, the Likud and the religious parties is deepening its anti-Palestinian offensive of a clearly pogromist character. The protests in Israel criticize the government and demand that it negotiate the exchange of prisoners with Hamas, but they support Zionist domination. Progressive anti-occupation sectors are very much in the minority. On the other hand, the Palestinian Authority of Abbas and the PLO in the West Bank play a role of more or less open collaboration with Israel. As for Hamas, Hezbollah and other bourgeois and jihadist nationalist leaderships, their political project is a capitalist and Islamic fundamentalist Palestinian state in the style of Iran, which we consider reactionary and authoritarian. We are separated from this strategy by irreconcilable differences, which is why we encourage the construction of a new revolutionary, socialist and internationalist Palestinian leadership.
7. Despite these fundamental differences, we unconditionally support the cause of the Palestinian people for their liberation and self-determination, their right to defend themselves by all means at their disposal, and to return and recover their usurped homes and lands. We call on the youth, workers and peoples; on human rights and popular organizations, on anti-Zionist Arab and Jewish activists in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, the Maghreb and the entire world to redouble their mobilization in repudiation of the State of Israel and in support of Palestine. The first task of revolutionary socialists is to promote the greatest possible unity of action against the Zionist genocide and in solidarity with the Palestinian people. We extend this support to the Lebanese people, today under attack with impunity by Israel.
8. There has not been, there is not and there will not be any just and lasting peace in the Middle East as long as the oppression of the Zionist, theocratic and terrorist State of Israel, artificially positioned as a pro-imperialist gendarme of the Arab peoples, persists. Nor with the failed two-state policy that imperialism and its allies are trying to recreate, nor with a capitalist and Islamist Palestinian state. To play a progressive role, the Israeli working class and youth must break with Zionism, reject its war and support the Palestinian cause. Peace will only be possible with the definitive defeat of the oppressive Israeli state and its replacement by a single, secular, democratic and socialist Palestine within the framework of a regional socialist revolution.
9. The undersigned organizations propose:
US and all imperialists out of the Middle East!
The broadest international mobilization in defense of and in solidarity with the Palestinian people against Zionist apartheid and genocide. Solidarity with the people of Lebanon in the face of Israel’s aggression.
An immediate ceasefire and an end to Israeli attacks on Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and Syria. Zionist troops and settlers out of Gaza and the West Bank.
Demand that governments break diplomatic, economic, academic and military relations with Israel. Support for the BDS campaign: boycott, divestment, sanctions.
Freedom for all Palestinian detainees in Israel. Right to return for Palestinian refugees and to recover their lands and homes. Full equality of rights.
For the destruction of the Zionist State. For a single, secular, democratic and socialist Palestine from the river to the sea, where all peoples live in peace.
Down with the Arab monarchies and capitalist governments, accomplices of Zionism and imperialism. For a federation of socialist republics in the Middle East.
