You have stood up, fought for, exposed the truth of what this system and this country are doing to the Palestinian people. You have defied authority and rejected passive acceptance of your country which is committing a great crime yet again, and you have stung Biden and the system he represents.
We who have stood up are right: Israel with full backing of U.S. imperialist arms, money, intelligence is committing a horrific genocide in defense of an apartheid state. Those who deny this are wrong. You who have stood up have torn into the façade of the U.S. and Israel as “defenders of justice and democracy.” For this, the system—wounded—is striking back. This shows that our struggle has hit a nerve.
You are right to say opposing Zionism is not antisemitic. They are wrong.
The system is trying to make you pay a price for opposing their savage slaughter of human beings—including 8,000 children—in Gaza. Biden to campus administrations to Zionist trolls have slandered you and tried to deprive you of your livelihoods, they’ve doxxed you, threatened you and treated your protests harshly.
Those committing a horrific genocide right now go so far as to accuse you who are fighting it of being “for genocide.” Talk about the big lie! Then last week, they even hauled the presidents of major universities before kangaroo-court congressional committees for trial-by-sound-bite-and-tape-splice, enduring public humiliation with the President of the University of Pennsylvania losing her job. This should not stand.
The repressive actions against your protests by politicians of both parties trying to stamp out the truth show that when their window-dressing of democracy begins to fail them, they come down with the hard hammer of threat and brute force—the dictatorship that they exercise over millions of oppressed people here and around the world.
We face a crossroads. Now is not a time to tamp down our resistance in the face of such repression. Or just go back to homework or plan for vacation. No. Now is the time to step up. To defend each and every one of us who come under attack while we spread this movement even more broadly to others, make it even more daring and militant, and take the time to go much more deeply into the causes and solution of the problem—a real revolution to overthrow this system.
Bob Avakian, the revolutionary leader and architect of the new communism, has written:
Why is Biden, and basically the entire government and ruling class of the U.S., supporting Israel in carrying out genocide against the Palestinian people, before the whole world? This is not because of “the power of the Jewish lobby”—or because of some ignorant, ridiculous and outrageous notion that “Jews are controlling everything.” It is because Israel plays a “special role” as a heavily armed bastion of support for U.S. imperialism in a strategically important part of the world (the “Middle East”). And Israel has been a key force in the commission of atrocities which have helped to maintain the oppressive rule of U.S. imperialism in many other parts of the world.
This—maintaining and enforcing the murderously oppressive domination of U.S. imperialism—is the same motivation for why Biden is pushing to further escalate the proxy war the U.S. is waging against Russia in Ukraine, as well as further preparation for war with China, even at the cost of risking the very existence of humanity.
All this is basic truth about essential reality. And it sharply highlights once more the profound importance of my statement that We, the people of the world, can no longer afford to allow these imperialists to continue to dominate the world and determine the destiny of humanity. They need to be overthrown as quickly as possible. And it is a scientific fact that we do not have to live this way.
(From "Some Basic Truths About the U.S.-Supported Israeli War Against Palestine")
Overthrowing this system means making revolution—a real revolution. This revolution is not just necessary, it is possible—and not in some far off future, but possibly soon. Even as the rulers of this system are united behind supporting Israel to the hilt, they are at each other’s throats. The fierce conflicts right now between the MAGA-fascists like Trump and the “regular” war criminal imperialists grouped around Biden over how to rule this system have not been this sharp since the Civil War of the 1860s. With attempted coups and and threats of open dictatorship, these times are much more dangerous but also open up much greater possibilities to break the hold of this system over masses of people. They provide the basis for “the forces for the revolution that is urgently needed [to] grow, quickly, from small numbers to thousands, and then millions, and get in position to go for the whole thing"—with a real chance to win. (From REVOLUTION—Building Up The Basis To Go For The Whole Thing, With A Real Chance To Win: Strategic Orientation And Practical Approach)
All those who recognize the criminal nature of this system need to be part of this revolution—now. All those who want to see the boot of the U.S. empire off the backs of the people of the world need to be part of shaking awake others—now.
Revolution will be hard and it will require real sacrifice—they have shown us every day what they are willing to do when their rule is challenged even by something far short of revolution. But it will be a real chance. A real chance for a whole new way to live, and a fundamentally different system.
In the name of humanity, we need to win the fight to stop this horrific war on the Palestinian people. And to wage that fight as part of getting people ready to make revolution, now more urgent but also more possible than ever.
