December 12, 2023

U.S.-armed Israel’s mass murder of Palestinian civilians in Gaza has brought a new element to world history, a new horror. It is the first genocide splashed across TV screens and social media.

The horrors have forced a new generation of political activists around the world to come to terms with these truths: The leaders of U.S. imperialism and of the Israeli state have colluded in genocide, ethnic cleansing and mass murder. They have bombed and killed civilians who have no chance to seek shelter or escape.

They have bombed hospitals and destroyed healthcare for 2.3 million people. They have deprived the population of food and water.

Those who pay any attention see these horrors every day. Up close.

The result: A worldwide movement of millions of people has sprung up since Oct.7 to fight against the U.S.-Israeli criminals. In some countries of the Global South, millions came out in protest. And in the imperialist NATO countries, despite some European governments forbidding protest and enormous social pressure in the United States, this movement has stayed in the streets.

This movement is growing and developing day by day. Its activists learn how the Israeli regime lies and Joe Biden repeats these lies. They understand how not only the Israeli regime but all G7 governments are criminal, with Washington at the head.

Many of the demonstration leaders have roots in Palestine and know the history of that struggle inside out. They can teach their peers and expose the lies manufactured by the most powerful media machine in human history.

So far those who have been in the streets for more than 70 days are continuing the fight to stop the bombing, to stop the horror, to stop the unspeakable. The mostly youthful demonstrators show courage when they defy the pressure of imperialist-manufactured public opinion and defy the authorities who order them to stop demonstrating, stop fighting to end the slaughter and stop supporting the Palestinian resistance.

And how can they stop demonstrating when the suffering continues in Gaza? When it’s impossible to forget that these mass murders are underway? No one can say, “I didn’t know.”

And despite the horrible destruction and mass murder in Gaza, resistance continues in the Strip. Guerrilla fighters battle Israeli tanks. The people of Gaza denounce Israel and the U.S. and the rest of the governments that fail to stop Israel, or even to try. But despite all their suffering, the Palestinians don’t denounce their own leaders.

On the other side, the criminal Israeli and U.S. leaders exude fear of this powerful uprising, which has military allies in Yemen and Lebanon. Washington was so isolated that it had to veto a proposal to the United Nations Security Council to stop a simple demand for another humanitarian cease-fire.

Why does Washington back Israel?

How we Marxists and anti-imperialists have explained the connection between world imperialism and Israel, is that imperialism, first led by Britain, later by the U.S., implanted a dependent settler state in an oil-rich region to be used as a cat’s-paw, a secure aircraft carrier, against any liberation movements in that part of the world. The people who identified as Israeli would be convenient cannon fodder.

U.S. imperialism has used the Zionist state to protect its interests in West Asia. Israel needs the Pentagon and the U.S. State Department behind its goals of expansion and expulsion. The unspeakable crimes they’re both now committing are driven by this mutual need even though Washington is the world power.

Right now, waging a constant, determined struggle against the ongoing genocide is an urgent necessity.

Next, and it’s the best punishment for the Israeli regime’s crimes, is to mobilize solidarity with the Palestinian resistance fighting for self-determination against an apartheid settler state.

Behind the genocide, the mass murder, the cruelty that no one can now forget, is the unequal system of capitalism and imperialism that demands profits, control of natural resources, militarism and war.

The best punishment for Washington’s crimes in the long term is that a whole new generation of activists devote their lives to overturning the oppressive world system that made these horrors happen.