The U.S.-backed Israeli aggression in the Middle East has created an extremely dangerous situation for the people of the region and the world. It has been a one-sided genocidal slaughter against the Palestinian people in Gaza, carried out by Israel, but armed and backed by U.S. imperialism.

In one year Israel has killed more than 41,500 people in Gaza and more than 2,000 in Lebanon. Millions of people have been displaced in the region. Israel, with U.S. support, turned it into a wider regional war with a surprise attack on Hezbollah, a reactionary Islamic fundamentalist group in Lebanon. It then invaded Lebanon.

Iran, which supports Hezbollah, retaliated in turn with a missile attack on Israel, which is preparing its own military response to Iran, “in consultation with” the United States. This is an extremely dangerous situation, not only for the people of the region, but for the world. In this situation, a few truths must be kept in mind:

1. This Israeli-U.S. aggression is totally unjust, and the primary responsibility for any wider war lies with the United States. The U.S. imperialists have armed and supported Israel with massive amounts of military aid for over 60 years, and Israel functions as a U.S. bastion of domination in this strategic region of the world.

2. The danger of a civilization-ending nuclear war is real, and must be understood and opposed. Israel is a nuclear power, as is the United States. Iran is a budding nuclear power, on the verge of being able to develop a weapon, and has allies in Russia, China, and North Korea, which are themselves nuclear powers. This makes it all the more urgent to oppose this war and to push for the need for a revolution that works to end such weapons of mass destruction and all reactionary wars.

3. Israel is a settler-colonial racist-apartheid state, imposed on the peoples of the region 76 years ago as an instrument of imperialist domination—and for over 50 years as a direct attack dog of U.S. imperialism, in the Middle East and around the world. U.S. rulers paint Israel’s aggressive genocidal actions as “self-defense.”

4. The United States is by far the world’s leading oppressive power, soaked in blood and at the top of a system of capitalism-imperialism, arming, funding and relying on the reactionary state of Israel to be its attack dog in the Middle East.

5. The Islamic Republic of Iran is a repressive, reactionary and misogynistic theocracy (religious dictatorship). It has carried out murderous repression against its people and in particular against revolutionary forces and even against those who express any kind of dissent from its ruthless policies. Thus, this state—and all its equally reactionary religious allies in the region, including Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis—must not be supported, and genuinely revolutionary and progressive forces within Iran must be supported.

6. The Islamic Republic is not similar to the “conventional” theocracies of ancient history, but is a product of the expansion of the capitalist-imperialist system in the Middle East, and its umbilical cord is connected to it and feeds on it. It is a reactionary force that, on the one hand, depends on the dynamics of imperialist capitalism and its structures in the world and, on the other hand, is in conflict with it and derives its legitimacy from this opposition, and what takes over is the return to pre-capitalist ethics and social relations.

7. The fact cannot be ignored that Islamic fundamentalist forces are interwoven with the global capitalist system, that they are not something external to it, but neither are they of its “making.” Imperialism and Islamic fundamentalism are two obsolete poles of the same system, and supporting one or the other will only strengthen both. In the name of supporting any “national liberation” struggle, defending reactionary nationalist (and not really anti-imperialist) forces would be tantamount to stepping out of the boiling pot and into the fire.

8. In Colombia and Latin America, our primary responsibility to the peoples of the world is to oppose and fight to stop the crimes of the imperialists and the rulers of any country (including our own); and to support the truly revolutionary forces in the countries most directly involved, from the United States to Iran and throughout the Middle East.

Revolutionary leader Bob Avakian has repeatedly raised a point that is of great urgency: “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.”

The new communism, developed by Avakian, shows how humanity could be emancipated from this madness, and from all forms of oppression, through an actual revolution to overthrow this capitalist-imperialist system, and bring into being a radically different and far better system on the path to the emancipation of humanity in every country and around the world. Avakian addresses what such a revolution is and how it might be accomplished, including the rare opportunity we find ourselves in today, where this revolution is more possible, even in countries like the United States.

If you want to know what is happening, why it is happening, and what we need to do about it, it is extremely important to get into the new synthesis of communism developed by Bob Avakian (visit revcom.us). And you need to join the only people who are really working to make this revolution and seize the real opportunity to do so in these very dangerous times: the true revolutionary communists.

Revolutionary Communist Group, October 7, 2024 | ComRev.co | @ComRevCo