On Friday, the Grand National Assembly of Turkey convened with an extraordinary agenda at the request of the opposition parties to discuss Israel’s attack on Gaza, the genocide against the Palestinian people, and the deliberately imposed famine.

The General Assembly meeting came after the United Nations officially declared a famine in Gaza last week and Israel accelerated its operations to seize and ethnically cleanse Gaza City with the support of the imperialist powers.

The resolution, which is nothing more than a hypocritical and deceptive statement reiterating the Turkish bourgeoisie’s so-called opposition to the Gaza genocide, was passed “by consensus” according to the speaker of the Turkish parliament. However, the deputies of the Workers’ Party of Turkey (TİP) and the Labor Party (EMEP), who entered parliament in alliance with the DEM Party, announced that they did not participate in the vote and did not vote “yes.”

The nine-point resolution “strongly condemn[s] the occupation, destruction, and annexation practices that the Palestinian people have been subjected to by Israel for decades” and “call[s] on the international community to exert greater efforts to force Israel to accept a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, withdraw its armed forces from the region, and ensure the uninterrupted delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza.”

It calls on all national parliaments to “take urgent action to end all military and commercial relations with Israel and lift the embargo imposed on the Palestinian people; reject and condemn Israel’s genocidal and colonial policies in the occupied Palestinian territories; defend the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, maintain the perspective of a two-state solution, and call on countries that do not recognize the State of Palestine to do so.”

The resolution then reiterates a commitment to the failed “two-state solution”, while continuing the impotent policy of appealing to the imperialist powers that support, arm, and finance the genocide in Gaza. It is fundamentally based on Turkey’s quest to avoid damaging its ties with both its imperialist allies and Israel, as a NATO member.

The resolution was described as encouraging the steps taken by “some states that were previously silent or supportive of Israel... now to recognize Palestine and boycott Israel”, characterising the stage reached as “a great triumph for the conscience of humanity.”

In recent days, many countries have criticised Israel in response to the worsening famine in Gaza, an evident war crime, in which they are directly implicated and which has fuelled massive political opposition in their own countries. However, despite their rhetorical statements, these same states continue to trade with Israel, including by supplying it with weapons that enable it to continue its genocide, and continue to suppress anti-genocide opposition utilising fabricated accusations of anti-Semitism and police repression.

Ankara itself continues to fuel the Zionist regime in Israel with oil coming from Azerbaijan through Turkey, and allows US use of military bases in the country for Israel’s benefit. Moreover, Turkey’s trade with Israel, including military materials, officially continues through Palestine.

The reaction of Turkey’s capitalist establishment parties to Israel has nothing to do with principled opposition to the genocide against Palestinians. Since 2002, while the Erdoğan government has played a critical role as an ally of the US and NATO in bloody wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria that have killed millions and turned countless others into refugees, the bourgeois opposition parties have remained loyal to the line of US-NATO imperialism, regardless of their tactical differences.

Turkey’s criticism of Israel and the confrontation between these two allies have essentially developed as a byproduct of the imperialist war waged by US imperialism in its quest for complete domination over the Middle East. The growing tension and competition between Ankara and Tel Aviv stems from the struggle for geopolitical influence in the Middle East, particularly in Syria.

Israel used the Palestinian uprising on October 7, 2023, as an opportunity to launch a pre-planned attack to redraw the maps in the Middle East. As a proxy force for the US, Israel attacked Iran and its allies in Lebanon, Yemen, and Syria.

In December, Islamist jihadists backed by the US and Turkey overthrew the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, intensifying competition between Ankara and Tel Aviv and increasing the risk of regional war. Following the regime change, Israel expanded its occupation of southern Syria while targeting the rest of the country’s military infrastructure with large-scale air strikes.

While Turkey continues its military occupation in northern Syria against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and allied Kurdish forces (YPG-SDF), Ankara’s strong political and ideological ties with the new Damascus regime are seen as a threat by Tel Aviv. Israel, in response, supports and encourages the autonomy of minorities in Syria. While providing protection to Druze groups in the south, it views the Kurdish nationalist forces controlling Syria’s oil-rich northern and eastern regions as “natural allies.” Recently, Alawites also demanded an autonomous region in western and central Syria, covering the provinces of Tartus and Latakia, as well as some parts of Homs and Hama.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week, “I am not a naive person... I understand who we are dealing with, what we are dealing with [in Syria], and that is why we used force,” adding that his government was “under no illusions” about who controlled Syria. It is no secret that this statement was primarily aimed at Ankara.

Erdoğan warned Kurdish forces in Syria last week, threatening them over possible cooperation with Israel and their quest for autonomy: “Those who turn their direction towards Ankara and Damascus will win… Those who seek foreign patrons will lose. If the sword comes out of its sheath, there will be no place left for words and speech.”

The intensification of the imperialist war of redivision in the Middle East and the growing competition between Turkey and Israel have led Ankara to seek an agreement with the PKK since last year. The World Socialist Web Site explained from the outset that this has nothing to do with a democratic solution to the Kurdish question and is a reactionary attempt at an agreement between the Turkish and Kurdish bourgeoisies. The Erdoğan government, with the support of Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK, has officially confirmed this analysis by putting forward an equally reactionary “Turkish-Kurdish-Arab” alliance perspective to counter Israel’s expansionist ambitions in the region.

The expression of this search for agreement in parliament was the establishment of a commission to which all party representatives were invited, and which was supported by the participation of the TİP and the EMEP. The main function of the commission is to spread the illusion that pro-imperialist right-wing bourgeois parties can resolve fundamental political issues, including the Kurdish question, and establish a democratic regime.

The Sosyalist Eşitlik Grubu (Socialist Equality Group), the Turkish section of the International Committee of the Fourth International, appeals not to imperialist and capitalist governments, but to the international working class—the only social force capable of ending genocide and imperialist war—and strives to mobilise it in the struggle for political power. In this struggle, the following demands are essential:

• Turkey must leave NATO and close its bases in the country.

• End Azerbaijan’s oil shipments to Israel through Turkey.

• Halt the shipments of weapons to Israel.

• Boycott all trade and other economic activity with Israel. 

• US, European and other corporations assisting Israel in carrying out the genocide must be indicted and prosecuted. 

• Arrest Israeli officials for war crimes.

• End all repression of opposition to the Gaza genocide.