To the Editor:
The Communist Party of Canada condemns the barbaric Israeli aggression against Gaza, which has already killed 100 people including 23 children, and inflicted yet another serious blow to the infrastructure and economy. This crisis threatens to become even more dangerous as Israel prepares for a massive ground invasion.
The Netanyahu government is deliberately provoking this volatile situation for its own narrow political purposes, by whipping up anti-Palestinian sentiments in advance of the upcoming Israeli elections, and to prepare for possible military attacks against Iran and Syria.
This scenario poses the real danger of a wider regional conflict, or even a catastrophic war involving imperialist powers beyond the Middle East. Those who seek to assign "equal blame" for the crisis ignore the decades-long Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories in contravention of international law and many important resolutions of the United Nations. This so-called balanced approach also dismisses the fact that over 1,400 Palestinians were killed in the infamous Cast Lead operation of 2008-09, and that hundreds of Palestinians have been killed and injured by the Israeli forces during periods when there were no rocket attacks from Gaza.
The true motives behind the latest aggression were revealed by Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai, who told Haaretz newspaper that the goal of the present operation is "to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages only then will Israel be calm for 40 years." The agenda of Netanyahu and the most reactionary Zionist forces, and their supporters in the US and Canadian ruling classes, is the apartheid-style removal of the Palestinians from all the lands occupied and claimed by Israel.
The Communist Party of Canada calls upon all our members and friends to help step up the pressure on all parties in Parliament to speak out against the Israeli attacks in Gaza. We condemn the Harper Tories for their unconditional backing of Israeli aggression, and for their shameful support for the brutal genocide directed against the Palestinian people. We demand an end to Israel's illegal and inhuman siege of Gaza and an end to the continued occupation of the West Bank (including the removal of illegal Jewish settlements and the 'Apartheid Wall"). We reiterate our support for Palestine's right to self-determination expressed as a viable and truly independent state with East Jerusalem as its capital, including the right of return for all displaced Palestinians. This is the only way towards a just settlement of the Israel-Palestine conflict, which is critical for the achievement of genuine and lasting peace in the Middle East.
The first step towards such a solution is to mobilize maximum opposition to end the criminal Israeli attack against Gaza!
Darrell Rankin, Communist Party of Canada.
