Originally published in February, 2023
Aug 29, 2025
We find ourselves in the midst of a great historical reckoning regarding the occupation of Palestine. In the past two years, the Palestinian resistance movement has reached a stage where they pose, by the admission of Israeli government officials, journalists, and average citizens alike, a serious existential threat to the Zionist state. This is reflected by increasingly lethal resistance ambushes in the heart of Al-Quds and elsewhere, such as military checkpoints, roadblocks, and zionist settlements. The State of Israel (hereafter referred to as ‘israel’ or ‘the zionist entity’) grows increasingly divided in the face of increased resistance, a genocidal Knesset, and rising international pressure on behalf of the Palestinians.
The Battle of the Unity of the Fields in June of 2022 clearly marked a new chapter in the ongoing Palestinian intifada in the face of fascist zionist occupation. (Indeed, from that point onward, zionist intelligence has referred to the various resistance factions as a singular organized body.) The leading factions, including but by no means limited to the Party of Islamic Jihad, Hamas, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and Hezbollah (Lebanon) demonstrated the total unification and coordination of militant resistance throughout the whole of occupied Palestine. Coupled with the unconditional support of the Arab masses and regional governments such as Syria, Iran and Yemen (who are all uncoincidentally facing constant aggression from the US and/or its compradors), the Palestinian resistance was able to largely dictate the terms of the negotiated ceasefire without even tapping into Hezbollah’s nor Hamas’ military capabilities. This position of strength was also confirmed in the 2022 maritime deal between the zionist entity and Lebanon, which was negotiated, again, largely on Lebanon’s terms. Despite the full might of the United States and Europe backing the zionist entity, the settler state grows ever more deeply divided and is crumbling in the face of continued resistance. It is for this reason that many will seek to divide the resistance or delegitimize certain factions for this purpose. Many in the west do not support the Islamic resistance factions, such as Hamas, but such a stance only lends credence to zionist talking points labelling these factions as terrorists rather than what they are — Indigenous land defenders.
It is important for westerners to remember the Palestinian liberation struggle is, first and foremost, a nationalist and anti-imperialist war, not explicitly anti-capitalist. As communists, we at the PRP do recognize, however, the role capital plays in the subjugation and oppression of the Palestinian people. Nothing, however, will sway our unconditional support for any and all armed resistance in Palestine.
The zionist entity just held their fifth parliamentary election in the past three years alone. As the legitimacy of their government crumbles abroad, it crumbles too in occupied Palestine. Approximately one-third of zionist youth do not think the zionist entity will even exist in twenty-five years, according to a recent poll. Many zionist pundits view their nation as one on the brink of civil war. This is validated by various violent altercations between ultra-rightwing settlers and soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces (referred to henceforth as the Occupation Forces, or IOF) throughout occupied Palestine. Similarly, despite this iteration of the Knesset (zionist parliament) being amongst the furthest-right representative bodies in the history of the entity, its leaders still cannot maintain the coalitions necessary to maintain some semblance of stability in occupied Palestine.
The growing divisions in zionist society has led to an increasing number of israeli protests against the new Nethanyahu regime. Many settlers are advocating for increased brutality and repression in the West Bank, and the new government is leading the charge with settlement expansion in the West Bank and Al-Quds, with plans to officially annex the Jordan Valley. Cooler heads understand that reckless settlement expansion and escalated violence is a powder keg that could trigger uncontainable widespread resistance from Gaza to Jenin, thus accentuating one of the many heightening contradictions within the zionist entity. Nablus, ‘the Mountain of Fire’, is arguably home to the vanguard of popular armed resistance in the region thanks to the work of an emerging revolutionary faction known as the Lions’ Den. On numerous occasions, the Lions’ Den has led successful defenses of Nablus, Jenin and other occupied cities in the wake of invasions and covert missions by the IOF and israeli special forces units. Through urban guerrilla warfare and popular support ‘the Mountain of Fire’ is proving impossible for the zionists to keep order. Israel’s severely weakened domestic military superiority is reinforced by increased efforts by the west to employ color revolutions in attempts to overthrow the government of Iran, made up of staunch anti-zionists who represent the only other nuclear power in the region. Iran has consequently been a consistent major focus of PM Netanyahu’s rhetoric.
On the security front, zionist intelligence is continually being embarrassed as well, failing to locate or capture the vast majority resistance fighters they target, and all the while losing arms, bullets and drones to the resistance. Mossad agents are being apprehended and exposed from Iran to Malaysia. The response has been an increase in “collective punishment,” a war crime per the Geneva Convention, where family members of martyrs and prisoners are arrested or killed, and their homes and properties seized or destroyed.
While the new Netanyahu/Ben-Gvir government has escalated its tactics as alluded to above, such actions pale in comparison to what many zionists — prominent politicians and average settlers alike— eye as their next big move: the seizure and destruction of Al-Aqsa mosque, one of the three holiest sites in all of Islam. Currently under the jurisdiction of the Jordanian monarchy, the zionists have neglected repairs and maintenance of the site, and have refused to allow Palestinians to enter and worship in peace since the zionist occupation began. Lately, as the Temple Mount movement — the explicit call to build a Jewish temple on top of the ruins of Al-Aqsa — has gained serious political legitimacy in israel, the zionists have correspondingly escalated their advances to the point where the situation could explode at any time — despite the opposition of not only Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims, but many orthodox Jewish rabbis and community leaders. Some of these escalated advances include blocking a member of the Jordanian crown to enter the premises, and constant building of tunnels under the site in futile searches for the lost Ark of the Covenant, severely endangering the structural integrity of Al-Aqsa. Any further intrusion on the holy site constitutes an act of terrorism and gross vandalism which is, frankly, completely unprecedented in modern times.
If the zionists have their way, the resulting destruction will make the Swedish Quran-burning look like a campfire song. Any such acts will provoke an immediate response from Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims and others across the globe that will permanently bar the zionist state of any previously-held legitimacy.
While what fate holds within the walls of Al-Aqsa remains to be seen, change is also accelerating within the walls of zionist prisons in occupied Palestine. Successive waves of hunger strikes, prisoner exchanges, and inhumane conditions have led to increased oppression and resistance. Most recently, women prisoners have borne the brunt of zionist repression, crossing a clear red line with both the Palestinian civilian population and resistance factions. This has marked a clear escalation in resistance, with promises of a mass mobilization throughout Palestine in late March of this year.
In the wake of such rapid developments, we must recognize the role the western governments will play in attempting at every turn to dictate the direction of the resistance on their terms. Due to the rapidly evolving nature of the reality on the ground, western anti-imperialists, communists, and well-intentioned citizens alike must adhere to the demands and support the methods chosen by the resistance. Below, we outline the following essential points of unity for solidarity with Palestinian resistance in the west.
First, and foremost, we must recognize zionism for what it is: a settler-colonial and racist ideology. Once we identify zionism as settler-colonialism, we observe that the Palestinian struggle is not just about human rights, as liberal pundits and NGOs like to phrase it. Rather, it is principally an Indigenous struggle for land rights. To demonstrate we need only refer to the experience of the Palestinian mandate of the British empire. The zionist movement began in small spurts, with small land holdings being acquired largely though the purchasing of land from absentee Ottoman landlords based in cities like Beirut; following these acquisitions, Palestinian tenants who lived on and worked the land were largely evicted/expelled. (The Jewish National Fund, which is still operating in full force today, played a major role in establishing these early settlements.) Despite the segregation and ethnonationalism that already plagued these settlements, the settlers were still welcomed by the Palestinians as refugees from European antisemitism.
Following World War I, the British crown took control of Palestine from the Ottoman Empire, when less than 5% of both the land and the population was Jewish (an even lower percentage was non- Arab). Despite this, Arthur Balfour, a British antisemite who, like many fascists of his age, sought a permanent solution to the “Jewish problem,” devoted half of Palestine via declaration to zionist settlers despite no consultation or consent from any Palestinians. In fact, knowing this to be true, the British occupation banned all press and media in Palestine, to the effect which Palestinians learned of the mandate gradually over the course of months via word of mouth from contacts in surrounding Arab states.
The British used the budding Jewish supremacist movement and the resulting influx of zionist settlers to bolster and maintain their own colonial occupation. With the tacit consent and outright assistance of British colonial authorities, zionist paramilitaries like Haganah attacked and evicted innumerable Palestinian communities. Other groups, however, such as Irgun, turned their arms against the British so they could more completely annex Palestine and build a full-fledged zionist nation-state. It is important to recognize this contradiction, as it makes quite clear the real reason for Israel’s “independence”: the British empire could no longer effectively manage the territory post- WWII. It is not a coincidence nation-states such as India gained their independence from Britain at about the same time.
Resistance to any and all foreign occupation by the Palestinians was steadfast, however, despite the delayed initial response. The turmoil caused by rapid increases in zionist settlement sparked a general strike and subsequent armed revolt among Palestinians in 1936 that concluded three years later with a tentative agreement. Known as the White Paper, it limited Jewish settlement but resolved to establish dual states in Palestine in ten years. At the end of second world war, due to the British empire’s waning global hegemony, the UN became increasingly involved and eventually decided to partition Palestine.
The fragility and sheer injustice of the UN mandate culminated in a Palestinian uprising in 1947, which was brutally suppressed by a united front of zionist militias and political parties. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forced to leave their country as a result of this war. At its conclusion in 1948, settlers conducted mass killings, deportations, and evictions of entire communities, totaling over 700,000 Palestinian victims. This is known to Palestinians and Arabs everywhere as al-Nakba, (‘The Catastrophe’). The israeli government to this day attempts to suppress discourse around the Nakba and has notoriously destroyed as much evidence of former Palestinian villages as possible. Israel’s most prominent city, “Tel Aviv”, is still uncovering ruins of the ethnically cleansed village of Jaffa on its popular tourist beaches. Despite the full scope of its horror being embedded in all Arabs’ collective consciousness, Al-Nakba is still not officially recognized as an act of genocide by any nation-states or international bodies.
One can undertake a thorough study of the history of israel to form the conclusion it is a racist, settler-colonial entity, or one could just take Theodor Herzl, the ideological founder of zionism, at his word when he described the zionist occupation of Palestine as “the rampart of Europe against Asia, an outpost of civilization as opposed to barbarism.” Either way we arrive at the same conclusion.
Second, shifting the focus away from settler-colonialism to apartheid serves to shift the focus away from the illegitimacy of the zionist entity, thereby legitimizing the settler state and the presence of the settlers within it. While apartheid is one aspect of the zionist entity, israel is a settler society, thus settler occupation is the root of all forms of israeli oppression. One can observe how racist and unequal of a country South Africa remains today after falling victim to the same phenomenon. We must work diligently to avoid making the same mistake in Palestine at all costs, as even relatives of Nelson Mandela who have visited occupied Palestine have testified the day-to-day reality for Palestinians is “worse” than what they experienced under Afrikaner apartheid. Nothing less than total liberation in Palestine can be tolerated. This latter point is by far the most important for those of us in the west, for as total liberation comes closer and closer to becoming reality, more and more liberal zionists will attempt to save the state of israel from itself as it doubles down on its fascist, genocidal character. We must smash zionism.
By the same token, the oppressive role of the Palestinian Authority must be acknowledged. Of course, the Palestinian masses know this, but the principal role of the PA is to deceive neutral observers, and thus they must be called out. They work hand in hand with the IOF (and more recently, even closer with the US) in the West Bank and were called out by resistance factions for undermining their points of unity at a joint summit in Algeria in 2022. The Palestinian Authority, with Abbas as the figurehead, is not representative of the Palestinian people nor of their struggle for liberation. Much like the Democratic Party and their progressive wing in the United States, the PA serves as controlled opposition to white supremacy in occupied Indigenous land. It is important to make this clear because the same actors in the west who defer to and defend the PA’s legitimacy also work to delegitimize armed resistance in Palestine. Palestinians have the inalienable right to defend themselves and their land by any means necessary, regardless of what the onlookers in imperialist nations deem legitimate or acceptable.
Third, the existence of the zionist entity on Palestinian land can never be normalized, and settlers in occupied Palestine — and everyone otherwise complicit in zionist occupation — must be fully held accountable. As no zionist settlers are originally from Palestine, (three or four generations of violence and pillaging as opposed to one or two makes no meaningful difference), they must forfeit all Palestinian land and property they occupy and learn to live without settler status and privileges. The Palestinian people, of whom many still treasure their keys to family homes stolen by zionists, have the full, non-negotiable Right of Return. Because of al-Nakba and the ongoing occupation of their homeland by zionist settlers, the Palestinian diaspora is the largest refugee community in the world. Thanks to the sacrifices of the resistance, this reality will inevitably change. It is the historic duty of onlookers and mediators to prevent western governments from further undermining total, inexorable liberation and return.
Fourth, zionism is antisemitic and fascist. We contend that zionism is fascism not to make sensationalist comparisons of Jewish suffering under nazism to Palestinian suffering under zionism. Rather, we stress how zionism, both in ideology and political economy, developed from a form of proto-settler colonialism into one of total settler-colonial fascism. Fascism is an ideology with an international character. It takes on various forms and appearances in the nations where it manifests but it seeks international support along common fascist principles. Along with the militarism and economic domination of capitalism-imperialism, fascism employs settler colonial methods to replace Indigenous society. Further settlement of land and resources eroded away at Indigenous culture and identity. Observe the status of settlers in Fascist Rhodesia, South Africa, Germany, Portugal, Spain, and Italy over the Indigenous populations these states colonized. The zionist project and the israeli state are yet another example of fascism. It is quite literally an ethnostate, and citizens’ rights and privileges depend on whether they are classified as an israeli national or simply an israeli citizen. This designation solely depends on whether the individual in question is Jewish, making occupied Palestine an explicitly Jewish supremacist state. The 2022 coalition in the knesset between Netanyahu’s likkud, Ben Gvir’s hayil, and the numerous other ultranationalist parties represents only the latest instance of israeli fascism, one that is quite open about its genocidal character.
As resistance to zionist fascism increases as well, we must fight against zionists’ attempts to redefine antisemitism and claim all resistance towards the zionist entity as antisemitic. This ideological struggle is essential for the liberation of Palestine, as the new IHRA definition of antisemitism is being adopted by more and more organizations while the horrors of zionism are increasingly normalized. While there are many, many flaws and dangers to this intentional approach the zionist leaders are taking, we can outline our opposition to it on a few basic grounds. It is zionism and the israel which are inherently antisemitic.
Antizionist Jews are labelled as “not real” or “self-hating” by zionists. The use of Yiddish was and is discouraged by zionists for its supposed backwardness (Eastern European origin) in favor of fetishizing the previously dead language of Hebrew (Semitic origin). It is true even that Holocaust survivors were ridiculed as “weak” by established settlers upon their arrival — after zionists had continually violated the international Jewish boycott of Nazi Germany in the 1930s! All of these instances, while appalling on their own, are only scratching the surface of zionist antisemitism.
Moving forward with the understanding that israel is the political manifestation of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, common sense implies the zionist entity has always required, and will always require, incoming settlers to artificially replace the Indigenous population. Due to the Jewish supremacist foundations of the zionist ethnostate, these settlers must obviously be members of the Jewish diaspora who are disaffected with anti-Jewish hate in their home countries. Thus, not only does the zionist entity benefit from antisemitism in the west, but it is its lifeblood; the zionist entity relies on western antisemitism for its very existence. Zionist leaders have always been aware of this.
David Ben-Guiron (born David Grün in Poland), the first Prime Minister of the zionist entity, was quoted saying he would rather half the Jews of Nazi Germany flee to Palestine than all of them escape to Britain. Herzl was also aware of the relationship between zionism and antisemitism, writing on different occasions that “the Governments of all countries scourged by Antisemitism will be keenly interested in assisting us to obtain [the] sovereignty we want” and “the anti-Semites will become our most dependable friends, the antisemitic countries our allies”. Zionist leaders are aware of this relationship still, and it is evident when the israeli government arms the nazi azov battalion in Ukraine, or when antisemitic Hungarian government officials and neonazi Bolsanaroistas back the zionist entity. There is a reason the israeli flag was flown on January 6, the result of Christian zionism (the belief that Jews must return to “Israel” in order for the end times prophecy to be fulfilled) and AIPAC donating money to GOP insurrectionists aligned with politicians who believe in the great-replacement-theory. In fact, the most powerful zionist organizations in the US, by both membership numbers and total capital, are Christian zionist organizations. There is a reason why Donald Trump was the world leader who declared occupied Al-Quds to be israel’s capital, and enjoys at least a 70% approval rate among the settlers there. (Over 75% of Jewish people in Trump’s own country, meanwhile, have an unfavorable opinion of him, further exposing these contradictions.) Jews don’t run the world; white supremacists do. Zionists fall under the latter category. There are real reasons why the state of israel and its benefactors have a vested material interest in the continued oppression of the Jewish diaspora. Contrary to what many may say or think, the Palestinian resistance is not antisemitic; allegations of this nature only serve to de-center indigenous Palestinians and their struggle. They also distract from the real source of Jewish oppression — European colonialism, imperialism, and white supremacy.
It should also be mentioned that zionism is just as much anti-Black as it is anti-Palestinian, and not just because of the perpetual coordination between the IOF and US military & police, including the knee-on-the-neck tactic that killed George Floyd. The state of Israel currently controls all movement and trade in the land bridge between Africa and Eurasia thanks to its artificial borders and western militarization. This is why US President Joe Biden has said, on multiple occasions decades apart, that “if Israel didn’t exist, the United States would create one, to protect its interests in the region.”
Fifth, liberal zionists are actively working to maintain settler-colonialism in occupied Palestine. “Social fascism” is a term we at the PRP use to categorize politics that align with fascist economic interests while maintaining a socially progressive facade. We posit that the term “social fascist” perfectly applies to liberal and “leftist” zionism in occupied Palestine and throughout the world.
Labor Zionists were actually the ruling party during the 1967 war of expansion against Syria, Egypt, Jordan and Palestine. (Syria’s Golan Heights remain occupied to this day as a result of that war.) Before that, the original zionist trade unions banned any Palestinian participation or membership. Segregation in employment and residential areas reinforced the newly-created racial hierarchies along class lines. Today’s liberal zionists reject explicit legal apartheid in israel, yet they also call for two states, or totally obscure or muddy the 2-state question altogether, the practical effects of which are explicit or implicit support for continued settler occupation of Palestine. As long as Palestine is occupied by a zionist state, which has always existed to enforce an ethnic hierarchy upon Indigenous land, it cannot be free. Despite this harsh reality of settler-colonialism, liberal zionists consider the rejection of israel’s right to exist as antisemitic. They cling to the colonial mythology of zionism, so easily weaponized by the fascists they claim to oppose. Faced with Indigenous resistance to occupation, they self-indigenize. They deny their current complicity or participation in systems of colonialism, apartheid, and genocide. Many choose to harass, threaten, and undermine the efforts Palestinian activists and students rather than stand in true solidarity with them and center their voices. And despite the consistent allegiance to the state of israel from labor zionists, the state has failed them too, with over one-fifth of all settlers sitting below the poverty line (Palestinians, of course, suffer economically at a rate at least twice that of their zionist oppressors, with half the Palestinian population below the poverty line).
Liberal anti-zionists are joining Palestinian solidarity movements in the imperial core and (intentionally or otherwise) centering israelis alongside Palestinians in their own liberation struggle. This is anti-Palestinian and undermines the struggle for liberation. As well-meaning as these liberal actors may feel, their actions perpetuate a liberal misunderstanding of zionist colonialism and fascism in the west. Imperialist nonprofits and NGOs such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, etc. downplay the fascist settler occupation, limiting the struggle to one of anti-apartheid and concerns over “human rights”, which are in turn easily weaponized against states hostile to US imperial interests. Jewish-led “anti-zionist” organizations such as J Street, Jewish Voice for Peace, If Not Now, etc act similarly by recognizing israeli identity and ownership – sometimes outright calling for a two state solution. These organizations, and the individuals involved in these groups, cannot be allowed to dictate the direction of the Palestinian liberation struggle. Would we center ‘rhodesians’ alongside Zimbabweans? ‘afrikaners’ alongside Africans? Liberal/social fascist worldviews such as these must be overcome through scientific analysis, constant resistance, and principled ideological struggle.
Sixth, NGOs and lobbyists such as AIPAC and ADL serve as outlets of zionist, neoliberal, and fascist propaganda. Much of the financial backing for the aforementioned liberal zionist groups comes from the same donors that fund organizations such as AIPAC and the ADL, who are overtly racist and work hand- in-hand with the police, FBI and other oppressive institutions such as land grab universities to suppress dissent against the zionist entity and the forces of white supremacy it is aligned with. This can be seen as far back as 1967, when the ADL smeared the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), a civil rights organization, for being “antisemitic” after they released an essay in solidarity with Palestine. Examples of ADL’s repression include the 2014 Black Lives Matter protests in Ferguson, where organizers showed solidarity with Palestine after the 2014 bombings of Gaza. The ADL worked hand in hand with the feds and the police to repress these organizers, once again smearing the organizers as antisemitic. The broad goals and grassroots work of both the SNCC and BLM have withstood the test of time and such allegations are, even more so in hindsight, devoid of any substance whatsoever. These patterns of defamation continue through 2023 with the smearing of recent Palestinian organizing efforts, such as the Mapping Project, who are making a conscious effort to explicitly (and successfully) connect zionist occupation with white supremacy and class domination in the US and Canada.
The most simple litmus test for good or bad faith actors in organizing spaces is their individual or organizational line on the neocolonial Two-State Solution policy. Any stance that is ambiguous or does not unapologetically advocate for a liberated Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea is one that advocates for the preservation of the zionist settler colony on occupied Palestinian land.
While on the surface, there is absolutely nothing wrong with anti-apartheid activism, there are more sinister motives involved when this work is being done or led by the organizations mentioned above, or by anyone attempting to undermine the gains of the resistance. In real time, we are seeing a concerted effort towards describing the reality on the ground in occupied Palestine as simply apartheid rather than settler-colonialism, of which apartheid is a mere symptom.
Seventh, and finally, as far-right politics, nazism and fascism are increasingly normalized in the US, we must understand that antisemitism is on the rise too. Due in large part to the resurgence of grassroots fascism in the U.S., the past decade has witnessed an ominous rise in antisemitic vandalism, attacks, and assaults. The U.S. has never been a truly welcoming place for Jewish people. Jewish people of all ethnicities and backgrounds face ignorance, discrimination, and abuse along with more horrific acts of violence. We stand in solidarity with Jewish comrades fighting any forms of anti-Jewish hate they encounter. Zionism — with its settler-colonial and fascist ideology that relegates a vast diaspora and diverse, multicultural faith to a single artificial people and nation — presents yet another very real antisemitic barrier to Jewish liberation. Both the long history of Jewish resistance to antisemitism and the legacy of Jewish revolutionaries and communists proves that Jewish communities have a long legacy of community, self-defense, and inter-communal solidarity.
None of this is at the center of the Palestinian struggle, however, and this must be made clear. The primary contradictions in occupied Palestine are zionist settler-colonialism and fascist occupation.
These points will inform our principles for organizing in solidarity with Palestine as well as how we interpret future events.
Approved for publication by the Central Committee of the People’s Revolutionary Party
February 2023