Israeli airstrikes killed 104 Palestinians on 28 October, nearly three weeks after the ceasefire began in Gaza. The Israeli government now says it has resumed the ceasefire. The reason it gave for the strikes was retaliation for an attack on Israeli forces in IDF-held Rafah, which killed one reservist.
The ceasefire is still in its ‘phase one’, during which captives are being exchanged and the IDF maintains control of over half of the Strip, behind the ‘yellow line’. The blockade on aid into Gaza has been lifted but remains severely restricted.
Every part of the ‘Gaza peace plan’ remains a potential source of volatile disagreements. Israeli forces have violated it scores of times. Palestinian fighters in the IDF-controlled zone attempt to return from positions beyond the ‘yellow line’; there are repeated tragic disputes over the identities of the remains of deceased hostages recovered from being buried under rubble; accusations of incursions.
Meanwhile, Israeli state-sanctioned violence against Palestinians in the West Bank continues. Israeli forces continue to strike targets in southern Lebanon and threaten to resume strikes on Houthis in Yemen.
Government representatives from seven Arab and Islamic majority nations, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and Pakistan, met in Turkey on 3 November to discuss establishing a future international ‘stabilisation’ force to be stationed in Gaza.
What faith could ordinary Palestinians possibly have in forces deployed by the ruling elites of those nations, many themselves resorting to violent repression at home, and all representatives of exploitative capitalism?
It is the struggles of the working class and masses – of Palestinians, and others across the Middle East and internationally – that can offer a route towards peace, based on socialist change to meet the needs of all.
The horrors of the capitalist system, displayed brutally by events in Gaza and capitalist politicians’ hypocritical responses, are having international consequences. It has been the trigger for a general strike in Italy, provoked repeated mass protests across the world, played a role in the likely election of a self-proclaimed socialist mayor of New York City, and precipitated potential developments towards a new mass workers’ party in Britain.
The primary task for socialists in Britain is to strengthen and build the organisations of the working class, to win them to the fight for socialist change, in solidarity with the working class and oppressed internationally.
