Cease-fire in Gaza: Imperialism Means Only Truces Between Endless Wars

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After eight days of air, naval and land bombardment upon the Gaza Strip a "truce" was signed between Israel, Hamas and other Palestinian resistance organizations under the auspices of Egypt.

During these eight days where Israeli warplanes carried out 1350 raids, the bombing killed 156 people; leaving aside the victims of "targeted killings", there were 103 civilians, including 33 children, 13 women and three journalists among the victims (one building which housed journalists was targeted by the Israeli army who wanted to stop the broadcasts of a TV station), and leaving a thousand wounded: 971 civilians, including 247 children, 162 women, 12 journalists. During this same period, Israeli repression against the protests in the West Bank left two dead and over a hundred injured while 76 Palestinians were abducted to Israeli prisons (1).

On the Israeli side, there were 5 deaths: the famous missiles launched by Hamas and other groups have no military value, but only a "psychological" value because, unguided, they fall at random (some even falling back on Gaza).

This macabre list demonstrates the essentially terrorist character of the Israeli action aimed at intimidating the local population in general and in particular the principal force that directs the territory, Hamas: it was not to intended to destroy its power, but to make it understand that it can only be tolerated by Israel (and its imperialist sponsors) to the extent that it is successful in preventing any action against Israel, i.e. to the extent that it succeeds in being an effective screw in this giant open-air prison that is Gaza (remember that according to an agreement with Israel which remains fully in force Egypt's Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood continues to hermetically seal off the borders of Gaza!).

The Israeli attack received support, expressed or implied, by the big imperialist countries, starting with the United States, but also of European states, on behalf of "Israel's right to defend itself"; regarding the right of Palestinians to defend themselves and resist, for imperialism this is a "terrorist" demand: under capitalism, the oppressed, whether they are populations subjected to colonialism or national oppression, or exploited proletarians, have only one "right", that is to accept their fate and to respect the established order!

Since its inception, the State of Israel has been the policeman of imperialism in the region, that is why the great powers, do not hesitate to pass over all its colonialist whims and all the violations of diplomatic agreements in silence: one does not ask a henchman to follow the code of good manners!

Today Israel's role is even more irreplaceable in a situation where the disappearance of former Arabic regimes subservient to imperialism and the persistence of disorders in others are factors of uncertainty for the imperialist order. The democrats who imagine they can hinder the exactions of the Israeli state by addressing the UN or large states to enforce international law are mistaken: under capitalism might is right, as indeed was shown on the first day in the history of Israel.

A colonial state, it expanded its territory at the expense of the Palestinians through wars won by military force and the support of the great powers. The so-called "agreements" or peace "processes" signed over the years have not stopped the process of colonization which after a "moratorium", resumed in 2011 in violation of UN resolutions demanding its cessation: these accords only meant the capitulation of various Palestinian organizations under imperialist pressure. In early November the Israeli government decided once again to accelerate the colonization, and issued a request for tenders for the construction of more than a thousand homes in Jewish settlements in the Arab part of Jerusalem, and others in the West Bank (2).

There are now more than 340,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank and nearly 200,000 in annexed East Jerusalem; this corresponds to only a small fraction of the Arab population, but these settlers are grouped in a system of colonies crisscrossing the territory and they are connected through "strategic routes" planned so as to render virtually impossible any eventual independence of the West Bank.

The permanent repression of the Palestinians in order to make them bow to the colonial order has resulted in filling Israeli prisons with detainees who can languish there indefinitely: "administrative detention" allows for keeping suspects in jail for 6 months, and renewable indefinitely.

In the Spring of this year a long hunger strike of 1600 Palestinian prisoners against administrative detention was successful: sanctions were lifted, solitary confinement ended, authorization of visits for prisoners from Gaza was reinstated (they were suspended since 2006), along with the promise of liberation at the end of their sentence, against the commitment not to engage in "terrorist acts" in prison.

But the retreat by the Israeli authorities faced with the menace of an explosion in the prisons does not mean that they now intend to treat Palestinian prisoners as ordinary citizens.

If proof was needed, it was given by English lawyers in a report published in late June by the British Ministry of Foreign Affairs on "Palestinian children in military custody." The report speaks of torture inflicted on child prisoners who numbered more than 200 in May; between 500 and 700 are imprisoned each year in the West Bank by the Israeli army, they can be arbitrarily detained without charge for more than 6 months, etc.. (3). Another report, this one on adult prisoners, released on June 25 showed that 100% of them suffered "bad treatment" or torture in various forms (4).

All this is only one aspect of the daily oppression experienced by Palestinians, oppression which does not move the leaders of our imperialist democracies, at times so quick to give lessons on human rights, but only when it coincides with their interests. The European Union is the largest importer of Israeli goods, and carries out multiple agreements of economic partnership with Israel (5): what importance could the the oppression of the Palestinian people have in the face of juicy business opportunities?

Hamas welcomed the truce with Israel as a "victory", and effectively it was one for a party which the first time was almost openly recognized internationally as the legitimate embodiment of order in Gaza.

But this is by no means a defeat for Israel, who, to make it clear that its hands had not been tied, conducted raids in the West Bank on 22 and 23 November, arresting more than 80 people including seven elected representatives of Hamas.

But, most important, it is not a victory for the oppressed masses of the Gaza Strip.

On the one hand it is only a "truce" and the State of Israel has once again demonstrated that it can kill and destroy with impunity when it decides to achieve its goals: the smokescreen of peace agreements has long since been dissipated by Israeli bombs; on the other hand Hamas crowned with its halo of "resistance" and the number of its "martyrs" will redouble its efforts not only to prevent any attack against Israel, but also to reign through a particularly reactionary bourgeois order.

Massacred by the Israeli enemy, the Palestinian oppressed masses will be subject to the repression of their "brothers" who signed the truce with it, and exploited by the local capitalists who could eventually develop with capital promised by Qatar: the hell that they find themselves in is the hell of capitalism in which the proletarians are always the victims. Neither Egypt nor Iran, nor any bourgeois state will come to their aid.

As long as the imperialist order is not destroyed, that is as long as capitalism endures, then the oppression and exploitation of the proletariat will not end. The situation of the oppressed masses of Palestine would be not be changed in any way by international recognition of a Palestinian state as wanted by the "Palestinian Authority", miserable sell-out stooge of imperialism even while despised by it: even if Israel and imperialism accepted it, it would be a particularly ferocious capitalist prison and perpetually under the threat of the Zionist state. There can not be a "just and lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians" as requested by the democrats who "forget" the existence of states, given that they exist through the oppression on which these states are based, and which they have the function of defending.

Only a revolutionary upheaval throughout the region, overthrowing all bourgeois states and uniting the proletarians of all nationalities and religions to smash oppression, can terminate the endless suffering of the Palestinian masses, like that of all the oppressed in the Middle East.

As seemingly remote as this perspective which is precisely that of the international communist revolution; it is infinitely more realistic than the perspective, attempted unsuccessfully for decades, of negotiations and appeals to the good will of the Israeli state and the imperialist states and which has resulted only in a continuing deterioration of the situation of the masses, even if it has allowed a layer of bourgeois Palestinians to live by the exploitation of their proletarians.

The proletarians of the imperialist countries bear the greatest responsibility for the brutalized situation of the Palestinian proletarians and masses: crushed by "their" capitalism and its Israeli protégé, they depend upon them, upon their ability to begin the fight against capitalism. Without the support of major imperialist states, the Israeli state would have the greatest difficulties in continuing its crimes and resisting the struggles they generate. The classics of communism insist that the proletarians of the dominant capitalist and imperialist powers can never achieve the international proletarian revolution without struggling against all forms of oppression, including national.

There is therefore no better and more effective solidarity with the proletariat and the oppressed Palestinian masses that the resumption of the class struggle in the imperialist centers.

Down with the massacre, oppression and repression of the Palestinian masses!

Long live the revolutionary class struggle against capitalism and world imperialism!

(1) List compiled by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, which also enumerates the list of establishments destroyed such as health institutions, schools, etc.. See:http:// www.pchrgaza.org / portal / en / index.php? option= com_content&view= article&id= 9046: weekly- report-on- israeli- human- rights- violations- in- the- occupied- palestinian- territory-14-21-nov

(2) http:// www.lefigaro.fr / flash-actu / 2012 / 11 / 07 / 97001-20121107 FILWWW00549- paris- condamne-l a- colonisation- israelienne.php

(3) http:// www.childreninmilitarycustody.org / wp-content / uploads / 2012 / 03 / Children_ in_ Military_ Custody_ Full_ Report.pdf . Often arrested at night, some are chained, deprived of sleep and food, etc.. The spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in London explained that it was the fault of the Palestinian Authority, which did not prevent them from committing crimes, forcing the Israelis to behave like this...

(4) http:// english.wafa.ps / index.php? action= detail&id= 20136 95% had been beaten, 63% had been beaten on the genitals, etc..

(5) The European Parliament voted late October a free exchange of pharmaceuticals with Israel within the framework of the Association Agreement with that country. But the pharmaceutical industry Israeli ets particularly involved in the occupation of Palestinian territories. See:http:// www.huffingtonpost.co.uk / rafeef-ziadah / european-parliament-israel_ b_ 1893829.html? fb_ action_ ids= 10151034915161927&fb_ action_types= og.likes&fb_source= other_multiline&ac