People's Democracy

The Central Committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) now in session at Kochi has adopted the following resolution on January 8, 2009:

Condemn Israeli Military Aggression On Gaza

The Central Committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) strongly condemns the continuing Israeli military attacks on the Palestinians in the Gaza strip.  Having aerially bombarded the Gaza, killing hundreds of innocent people, Israel has now moved its armed forces in a war of aggression against the Palestinians.  40 civilian refugees were killed by shelling on January 6 in a United Nations school and three more in another school. 

If the USA had not blocked a UN-sponsored ceasefire, at least these 43 civilians, many of them women and children, would have been alive.  This is the real nature of US imperialism's support to Israeli  aggressiveness. 

In this attack alone, over 600 civilians including more than 200 children have died so far and thousands of others maimed or injured.  Israel's plea that this military invasion is being taken to stop the violation of the ceasefire by the Hamas with its rockets fired at Israeli targets, is specious, to say the least.  It was Israel which broke the ceasefire first on November 4, 2008 when its bombardment killed six Palestinians in Gaza  and, again on November 17, when another bombardment killed four more Palestinians. 

Since 1948, tens of thousands of Palestinians have been massacred by Israel.  Of these, a large number have been innocent civilians.  Such barbarity is perpetrated in the name of fighting Palestinian terrorism.  The root cause of the conflict in West Asia  continues to remain the illegal  Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands. 

The USA and Israel list Hamas as a terrorist organisation.  It was the same USA that had insisted upon democratic elections to be held within Palestinian territories as a precondition  for taking forward the peace process.  In these elections, universally acknowledged by western observers to be free and fair, the Hamas won.  For US imperialism and Israel, however, democratic elections must always throw up those whom they want elected and not those whom the Palestinian people want.  Having asked for elections and overseeing them, US imperialism and Israel now refuse to accept the democratic  verdict of the Palestinian people.  It is this blatant refusal to accept popular mandate of the people by US and Israel  that is the root cause for the current hostilities that Israel is unleashing against the Palestinians. 

The Manmohan Singh government has identified itself as an ally of Israel which is harmful for the country's interests and spoilt India's traditional support to the Palestinian cause. Under these circumstances, it is incumbent upon the Congress-led government to immediately cease all military cooperation with Israel.  India cannot be a party to finance the inhuman Israeli juggernaut.  India must exercise its influence amongst the developing countries to mobilise for an effective implementation of an immediate ceasefire and for eventual realisation  of the Palestinian nation. 

Peace-loving humanity cannot and should not allow such barbarity to continue.  Israeli aggression against the Palestinians must immediately stop.  Currently, Israel is refusing  even to pause its aggression to allow humanitarian aid  to flow to Palestinians.  It is, thus, ensuring that many more innocent civilian Palestinians will die in the absence of food and medicines. 

The Indian people, who have always stood by the Palestinians in their genuine struggle for a homeland since the days of our independence struggle, must today rise in protest against this inhuman Israeli attack.  This expression of solidarity with the Palestinian people must be accompanied by much-required humanitarian assistance. 

While conveying our deepest solidarity with the Palestinians in this grim battle, the Central Committee of the CPI(M) calls upon the Indian people to mount pressure on the Indian government to take firm measures in mobilising world opinion to halt this military attack against the Palestinians immediately.