Rise Up for Palestine
The Israeli military has now killed more than 18,000 Palestinians in Gaza, at least half of them women and children. The mass murder is relentless, with accounts of mass executions now emerging, and other types of barbarism. Over 1.9 million of the 2.2 million people of Gaza have been displaced. These terms of death and displacement surpass the 1947-1948 Nakba, when Zionist militias fighting for the creation of the state of Israel murdered thousands of Palestinians, and sent more than 750,000 permanently out of their historic homeland.
This second Palestinian Nakba, and ongoing genocide, continues to be bankrolled by the United States. Early in November both parties voted to send 14 billion dollars in military aid to Israel. Just days ago, 412 members of both parties voted yes to a right wing Republican resolution which equates antizionism—criticism of racist Israel settler-colonial ideology and state policy—with antisemitism.
Supporting that resolution were prominent members of the “Squad”—supposedly radical Democrats elected with the support of groups like the Democratic Socialists of America. They included Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, and Cori Bush. Only two members of congress did not vote yes. Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian member of Congress who was recently censured for speaking for Palestinians (including censure support by 22 fellow Democrats) voted “present” and Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, voted against.
This duplicitous maneuver has pushed opened the door to a pro-Zionist offensive against all critics. Far-right Republicans have taken the initiative, passing subsequent resolutions that condemn the “drastic rise of antisemitism” in the U.S.—a false narrative that allows for reactionaries and Zionist to target and witch-hunt Pro-Palestinian organizations, activists, and anyone who opposes or speaks out against Israel’s genocidal onslaught in any capacity. Trumpian minions have also jumped on board, orchestrating an inquisition-like spectacle putting three college administrators on trial and grossly twisting a false narrative accusing them “tolerating” antisemitism. These show trials have also emboldened far-right billionaires like Bill Ackman and bullying, pro-Israel political hit squads like the ADL to set their sights on college campuses across the country and giving license to repress pro-Palestinian faculty and student organizations writ large.
The powerful U.S.-Israel axis of genocide that runs through the United States two-party system must be destroyed. U.S. tax dollars are paying for the mass murder of a defenseless, colonized population with the full-throated support of the most racist state in the world (outside of Israel): the United States. The genocidal war on Palestinian people is being carried out by both the US and Israel—even if Biden and Netanyahu pretend to be at odds over how many men, women, and children can and should be obliterated.
Showing its bloody hand, the US blocked a recent ceasefire resolution held in a special session of the 15-member UN Security Council, the only vote against and with veto power as a “permanent” member. Hundreds more Palestinian people have been bombed or shot each day since. In a counter act, the General Assembly of the United Nations took its own subsequent vote for a ceasefire. Exposing the US state’s imperialist arrogance, complicity, and isolation, 153 nations representing the overwhelming majority of the people of the world’s people voted for an immediate ceasefire with only 10 states opposing and 23 abstaining. The blatant self-interest of the US empire and its capitalist parties to encourage and enable the mass slaughter in Palestine, and the silencing of majority-representative voices and the victimizing of dissidents at home shows how deadly and deranged this system has become.
It is time for radicals, revolutionaries, anti-capitalists, anti-racists and people of good conscience everywhere to rise up. The people of Palestinian civil society from the Gaza to West Bank are crying out for our support. Their determination and fight to live in a society free of state-sponsored violence, racism, Islamophobia, exploitation and oppression is our own.
We must build a truly revolutionary alternative to the two-headed monster of US capitalist politics that subjects Palestinians to premature death while endangering the lives of its own oppressed people; what Martin Luther King, Jr. called “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world”.
From our revolutionary alternative, we must join with mass organizations on the ground like Students for Justice in Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace, Labor for Palestine, and international political groups like People Before Profit (Ireland), RS21 (U.K.), and the majority of peoples around the world calling for an end to the bombing of Gaza, an end to Israel’s illegal occupation, and the liberation and self-determination of the Palestinian people. We also welcome people to join with us in the Puntorojo collective and help us build a revolutionary socialist alternative here in the head office of capitalist imperialism and the shot-caller for Zionist-orchestrated genocide in Palestine.
