On September 27, a large rally and concert against the genocide in Gaza will take place in Berlin under the title “All Eyes on Gaza” (5:00–9:00 p.m., Großer Stern, Straße des 17. Juni). Members and supporters of the Socialist Equality Party will distribute and discuss the following statement there with participants.
Today’s demonstration shows the enormous opposition to the horrific genocide in Gaza. Millions of people are shocked by the sheer brutality with which Israel and its supporters in Berlin and Washington are enforcing their economic and geostrategic interests in the region. But after two years of ongoing mass protests around the world, it is time to take political stock: What is the political, historical and economic background to the genocide?—And what strategy and perspective can stop it?
The organisers of today’s demonstration, led by the Left Party, are promoting the illusion that this is merely a case of misguided policy on the part of the German government, which can be corrected with a little pressure from the streets. Their appeal is limited—apart from depicting the atrocities in Gaza—to a list of demands to the Bundestag (Federal Parliament) and the government, including humanitarian aid for Gaza, an end to arms deliveries and the release of hostages on both sides.
But the German government has not simply taken the wrong side; it is a driving force behind the genocide. Israel owes its very existence to its close alliance first with British and then with American and German imperialism. From the outset, the expulsion and oppression of the Palestinians served to create a military bridgehead in the Middle East in order to assert geostrategic and economic interests.
The imperialist powers see the genocide currently taking place and the suppression of any Palestinian resistance as the basic prerequisite for the reorganisation of the entire Middle East, which is of utmost importance with its raw materials and strategically central location. The genocide in Gaza is another front in the global conflict over the redivision of the world. The German government’s support cannot therefore be separated from its war plans against Russia and the horrendous arms build-up it is implementing. If it is not stopped, conditions like those in Gaza threaten to spread throughout the world.
But the Left Party remains silent on this. The appeal contains not a word about the largest arms build-up since Hitler, not a word about the ongoing escalation of the war against Russia, and not a word about the introduction of conscription and the militarisation of society as a whole. Instead, it formulates friendly demands on the federal government that serve only to lull the movement into complacency.
The reason for this is that the Left Party essentially supports the policies of the federal government. After the party was carried back into the Bundestag on the wave of anti-AfD protests, it immediately ensured the demobilisation of the demonstrations and forged an alliance with Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who had triggered the protests when he made a pact with the fascists of the Alternative for Germany (AfD). The Left Party used its votes in parliament to enable the rapid election of Merz as chancellor and even approved war credits of over €1 trillion in the Bundesrat, Germany’s second chamber of parliament.
The Left Party is now openly supporting rearmament and only demands that it be cloaked in a few social phrases. Parliamentary fraction leader Heidi Reichinnek told Tagesschau on Wednesday that Vladimir Putin was “of course a threat to our security,” thus backing the government’s absurd war narrative. She rejected cuts in the horrendous military budget and criticised the fact that, despite the special funds, the Bundeswehr had not yet become an army capable of defending Germany. “We need to talk about what really needs to be purchased,” Reichinnek said.
The Left Party also supported the government’s line on Gaza. On October 12, 2023, the Left Party fraction in the Bundestag voted unanimously in favour of the “Solidarity with Israel” resolution, which declares “Israel’s security” to be a German “reason of state.” Germany must “provide Israel with everything it needs and wants for its defence,” the resolution states. In addition to further attacks on fundamental democratic rights, the resolution also called for “residence law measures,” i.e., deportations, against pro-Palestinian activists.
The Left Party continued to pursue this line in the following months, repeatedly invoking Israel’s “right to self-defence”—as if the slaughter of children had anything to do with self-defence. Even the call to demonstrate today states: “We condemn all war crimes and human rights violations, regardless of whether they are committed by Israeli or Palestinian actors.” In doing so, the Left Party equates the desperate struggle of a people brutally oppressed for decades with the genocide of an oppressor armed to the teeth, allied with the most powerful imperialist powers.
When the Left Party now tries to place itself at the forefront of demonstrations against genocide, it does so only to control and stifle the movement. It very consciously sees its role as a defender of capitalism. As the Stalinist state party of the GDR (East Germany), it already organised the restoration of capitalism and subsequently participated in the worst social cuts in various state governments. Leftist rhetoric served only to push through these policies.
But the genocide in Gaza shows that capitalism is incompatible with the needs of the people. In their pursuit of profits, the imperialist powers are once again prepared to use the most brutal methods. During the financial crisis and the pandemic, they threw hundreds of billions of euros at the banks and corporations. Now they want to recoup this money and the enormous sums spent on rearmament through social cuts and war. The ruling class has only one answer to the deep crisis of capitalism: war at home and abroad.
To this end, Donald Trump is establishing a presidential dictatorship in the US, building concentration camps for immigrant workers, deploying the army in major cities and attempting to suppress any opposition to his government of the financial oligarchy. The Democratic Party lets him do as he pleases because it represents the same oligarchy. In France, too, Macron is using the police force against the growing strike movement, and in Britain, Starmer is summarily declaring opponents of the genocide in Gaza to be terrorists and having them arrested by the hundreds.
In Germany, this process takes the form of an all-party government in which the AfD, with its anti-refugee rhetoric and militarism, sets the tone.—And no voice is raised in the Bundestag against the madness of a war against Russia, against rearmament and against genocide. To finance rearmament and billions in gifts to the rich, education, healthcare and social spending are being cut. In addition, there are mass layoffs in industry to make Germany fit for war and trade warfare.
Massive resistance is developing all over the world against these attacks and the madness of a world war. In recent weeks, hundreds of thousands have gone on strike in France against Macron’s austerity and rearmament plans, and tens of thousands have protested in Italy against the genocide in Gaza. Today’s demonstration is also part of this mobilisation.
The crucial question is one of strategy and perspective. If the movement remains under the leadership of pseudo-left, pro-capitalist formations, such as the Left Party in Germany, Mélenchon’s new Popular Front in France, or Podemos in Spain, it is doomed to failure.
A serious anti-war movement must link the struggle against genocide with the struggle against rearmament and the escalation of war against Russia, and target the root cause of this barbarism: capitalism. Only if the big banks and corporations are expropriated and placed under democratic control can catastrophe be prevented. For capitalism is leading—as it did before the two world wars—once again to barbarism, war, and fascism.
Such a movement must be led by the social force that creates all wealth and bears the entire burden of war and crisis: the international working class, the vast majority of the population. The Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei (Socialist Equality Party, SGP) calls for the formation of rank-and-file committees in every factory, workplace, school and neighbourhood. “These committees must become centers of resistance, uniting all sections of the working class (in industry, logistics, transport, restaurants and fast food, social services, legal defense, education, arts and culture, entertainment, medicine, health care, sciences, computer technology, programming and other highly specialized professions),” as declared in a statement by the SGP’s sister party in the US.
The rank-and-file committees must break the crippling influence of pro-business unions and be completely independent of all capitalist parties, which—like the Left Party—are doing everything they can to derail and suppress the movement. Only by mobilising their independent power can workers put an end to capitalism and its war machine.
To do this, workers must unite across all national, ethnic, and religious boundaries. They must counter growing nationalism and war with the international unity of workers in the struggle against capitalism. This requires, in particular, the defence of the rights of immigrant workers.
“The strategy, organization and action that are necessary to defeat Trump, defend democratic rights, and prevent fascism and war will not emerge spontaneously,” the statement continues. “This program must be fought for. But the determination that is required to take up and wage this fight is incompatible with pessimism and demoralization. These moods lead to paralysis. Moreover, pessimism is invariably connected to a superficial and false appraisal of reality. The Democrats, the unions and the media cultivate the myth of an all-powerful government while insisting that nothing can be done. This is a lie. What is lacking is not mass opposition but, rather, a political strategy to guide and organize the struggle against Trump’s assault on democratic rights.”
We call on all workers and young people who agree with this perspective to join the SGP to mobilise the power of the working class, defeat the conspiracy of the oligarchs, and fight for a socialist future free of fascism, genocide, and war.