THE Palestinian resistance movement Hamas on Wednesday hailed the ceasefire agreement forced on the Israeli regime, saying that it has shattered prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ‘illusion’ of reshaping West Asia by force.
On Tuesday, Netanyahu’s ‘Security Cabinet’ finally accepted the ceasefire deal with the Lebanese Hezbollah, pushed on them by the US and France to end the deadly escalation of war by Israel on Lebanon.
Under the terms of this deal Israeli troops will withdraw from southern Lebanon while Hezbollah will withdraw its heavy weaponry away from the border.
When Israel invaded Lebanon Netanyahu boasted Israel would completely destroy Hezbollah, but as Hamas stated: ‘The enemy’s acceptance of the agreement with Lebanon without fulfilling the conditions it set out is an important milestone in shattering Netanyahu’s illusions of changing the map of the Middle East by force.’
The Israeli regime has killed over 3,700 people in Lebanon, including 42 killed on Tuesday just prior to the ceasefire agreement. In addition, nearly 15,700 Lebanese have been wounded.
The Zionist regime sent troops into southern Lebanon with its military commanders pledging to eradicate Hezbollah but now has been forced to accept a ceasefire agreement without achieving any of those goals.
Instead of the easy victory promised, Hezbollah responded with hundreds of successful retaliatory strikes against various military strategic targets across the occupied territories, while over 100 Israeli troops were killed and up to a thousand injured.
Reeling from having the illusions of reshaping the Middle East, on behalf of his imperialist masters, cruelly shattered Netanyahu has attempted to placate the extreme right-wing Zionists partners in his government, promising that the ceasefire would allow him to concentrate on destroying Hamas in Gaza and ethnically cleansing the Gaza Strip of Palestinians.
In Gaza, the Israeli regime has failed to smash Hamas or achieve its goal of crushing Palestinian resistance despite over a year of genocidal war that has killed 44,282, mainly women and children, according to the latest figures.
It is not just that Netanyahu’s illusion that the entire Middle East region could be reshaped by war has been exposed. The illusions of the imperialist nations, led by the US, that they could impose their mastery on the oil riches of the region for exploitation by world capitalism have also been smashed.
Instead, they have seen their proxy Zionist regime fought to a standstill by the Palestinians and the resistance movements across the region.
The barbaric genocidal war that the imperialist nations have encouraged and supported through the massive arming and financial support to Israel has generated massive opposition from workers and youth across the globe. In the US, UK and Europe the overwhelming demand from workers and youth is for a permanent ceasefire and an end to arming genocide.
Workers and young people know that their governments that give ‘cast iron’ support to genocide are simultaneously waging a war on the working class at home.
In Britain, the Starmer Labour government, that continues to supply parts used by Israeli planes to bomb hospitals and schools in Gaza, is at the same time quite prepared to see children starve, as a result of benefit caps, and 100,000 more elderly people being pushed into poverty and facing freezing to death this winter, thanks to Labour scrapping the winter fuel allowance.
This Starmer government that is prepared to inflict poverty and starvation at home, while supporting genocide and war abroad, must be brought down along with the capitalist system that it slavishly supports.
Workers must tell the trade union leaders that the time for sitting on the fence and merely passing motions in support of Palestine must end.
Workers must force an emergency congress of the TUC to immediately call a general strike to bring down the Labour government and bring in a workers government. This will end all complicity with Israel, recognise the State of Palestine and give all financial and military support to the Palestinian revolution.
In this period, where world capitalism and the profits of the banks and corporations can only survive through a war on two fronts, the time has come for the working class to intervene decisively, and use its strength to put an end to capitalism and advance to socialism.
Join the WRP and Young Socialists to build up the leadership required to organise a general strike and the victory of the British socialist revolution.
