Stop the EU’s support for the Zionist Apartheid state! Support the Palestinian and Lebanese Resistance against Israel!
Statement of the RKOB (Austrian section of the Revolutionary Communist International Tendency), 21 June 2024, www.thecommunists.net
1. Since the beginning of the genocidal war of the Zionist Apartheid state against the Palestinian people in Gaza, a low-intensity military conflict has taken place at Israel’s northern border with the Lebanese resistance movement. The Netanyahu government, shaken by international isolation, domestic mass protests and internal divisions, is desperate to keep the country in a state of war. The reasons are, on one hand, that the Zionist monster has failed – despite the horrible slaughter of tens of thousands of Palestinians and the displacement of most of the local population – to defeat the heroic Palestinian resistance or to free the Israeli prisoners in Gaza. On the other hand, the government would immediately collapse with an end of war and Netanyahu would most likely face a trial for corruption. For these reasons, Israel is determined to provoke a war against Hezbollah hoping also that it could drag the U.S. even more into the war. As Foreign Minister Israel Katz stated a few days ago: “We are very close to the moment of decision to change the rules against Hezbollah and Lebanon. In an all-out war, Hezbollah will be destroyed and Lebanon will be severely hit.”
2. The leader of Hezbollah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, said on 19 June that his movement does not want an expanded war, but that it was ready – along with its regional allies – to match Israel’s increased aggression. “All what the enemy says and the threats and warnings the mediators bring – and what is being said in the Israeli media – about a war in Lebanon does not scare us.” He also pointed to the close relations of Cyprus with the Zionist settler state and warned: “Opening Cypriot airports and bases to the Israeli enemy to target Lebanon would mean that the Cypriot government is part of the war, and the resistance [Hezbollah, Ed.] will deal with it as part of the war.” In the event of a broader conflagration “there will be no place safe from our missiles and our drones,” Nasrallah vowed. In other words, the looming war between Israel and Hezbollah could soon directly hit the European Union.
3. Hezbollah’s warning is well-founded because in the past years the government of Cyprus has built close relation with the Zionist settler state. Israel and Cyprus have a bilateral “defence” cooperation agreement and regularly conduct joint exercises. Since 2021, it has joined Israel’s “Noble Dina” naval drill. It also conducted largescale naval exercises in 2023 that saw Israeli naval fleets sail to Cyprus. Israeli special forces also train in Cyprus where the rocky terrain resembles Lebanon. In addition, Nicosia has also intensified its economic collaboration with Israel. It was a founding member of the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum, which tries to deepen energy cooperation with the settler state and some pro-Western Arab dictatorships. Nicosia also works towards building a new gas pipeline to cement energy cooperation with the Zionist Apartheid state. Furthermore, Cyprus – a former UK colony which gained independence in 1960 – hosts two British military bases. It is known that these bases have already been used in the past months to launch military strikes against the Houthis in Yemen – who are carrying out armed activities in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Likewise, the British bases have also reportedly been used to arm Israel in its war against Gaza and Lebanon.
4. In response to Nasrallah’s warning, the Cyprus government denied any involvement of its country in the Israel’s war. Its spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis said that suggestions that Cyprus – either through its infrastructure or territory – would be involved in any military operation in Lebanon is “totally groundless.” However, at the same time, Cypriot officials emphasised that under the treaty of establishment, Britain was not obliged to inform Nicosia about movements on the bases. It is noteworthy that the pro-Palestine solidarity movement in Cyprus has already organised several protest demonstrations against the pro-Israeli activities at the UK bases.
5. The imperialist European Union – of which Cyprus is a member state since 2004 – has quickly declared its support for Nicosia. Peter Stano, a spokesman for the EU’s Commission, said on 20 June “Cyprus is a member state of the European Union. This means the European Union is Cyprus and Cyprus is the European Union.” He added that this means that “any threat against one of our member states is a threat against the European Union.” Such support for Nicosia is consistent with the EU’s long-term support with the Zionist Apartheid state and its genocidal war. Strictly speaking this means that the EU could send its armed forces against Hezbollah in case the latter strikes, for example, UK military bases in response to pro-Israeli military activities there.
6. All this means that a full-scale war between Israel and Lebanese resistance could have several profound consequences. It would present the Israeli army – already exhausted from its 8-months war in Gaza where it failed to defeat Hamas – with a much more formidable opponent since Hezbollah is a considerable stronger military force than the Palestinian resistance. A war in the north could force the Israeli army to scale back its aggression in Gaza and the West Bank due to the strains on its forces. In addition, it could provoke a full-blown regional war since Hezbollah is the most important ally of Iran in the Middle East. Iran, in turn, is the most powerful military opponent of Israel in the region as it demonstrated with its strike on 13 April with more than 300 drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles.
7. The RKOB, the Austrian section of the Revolutionary Communist International Tendency (RCIT) strongly denounces the Zionist aggression against the Palestinian and the Lebanese peoples. Like our comrades in the Internationalist Socialist League (the RCIT’s section in Israel/Occupied Palestine), we stand for the military victory of the resistance and the defeat of the Zionist monster. We strongly oppose any military or economic support for Israel by Cyprus or by the EU. In any military confrontation of the Lebanese resistance against armed forces of Britain, the EU or Cyprus we side with the former and advocate the defeat of the pro-Zionist enemy.
8. We call the international workers and popular movement to intensify its support for the Palestinian liberation struggle. The trade unions and other mass organisation in Europe – dominated by a pro-Zionist bureaucracy – must be forced to boycott Israel by any means necessary – from blocking any arms deliveries, economic and financial boycott to the rupture of any ties of universities with Israel. Such a campaign must go hand-in-hand with the struggle against the pro-Zionist leaders within the workers movement. Likewise, the pro-Palestine mass movement in Türkiye must force the Erdoğan government to turn rhetoric into action and to deploy its armed forces to make sure that no pro-Israeli action can take place from the territory of Cyprus (including from the UK military bases).
9. While we side with Hezbollah and other Lebanese resistance forces in any confrontation with Israel, we also make clear that socialists strongly oppose the reactionary policy of Hezbollah’s leadership. Nasrallah has a long record of shameful support for the Assad tyranny in Syria and the capitalist Mullah dictatorship in Iran.
10. The RCIT calls socialists to join forces in building a Revolutionary World Party committed to the cause of the liberation of the Palestinian peoples and all other oppressed peoples. It is urgent to build such an alternative leadership which could replace the existing petty-bourgeois nationalist and Islamist forces currently at the top of the liberation struggles in the Middle East. Such a communist leadership would fight for the revolutionary destruction of the Israeli Apartheid state and the creation of a free and red Palestine from the River to the Sea. Such a single secular and democratic Palestinian state would enable all refugees to return to their homes. At the same time, it would guarantee equal cultural and religious rights for all citizens (including the Jewish minority). It should be a workers and fellahin republic as part of a socialist federation of the Middle East.
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We refer readers to special pages on our website where all RCIT documents on the 2023-24 Gaza War are compiled, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/africa-and-middle-east/compilation-of-articles-on-the-gaza-uprising-2023-24-part-2/ and https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/africa-and-middle-east/compilation-of-articles-on-the-gaza-uprising-2023/.
See also RCIT: In Gaza and in Lebanon: Support the Resistance – Defeat Israel! 07.06.2024, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/africa-and-middle-east/in-gaza-lebanon-support-the-resistance-defeat-israel/