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Final Declaration of the “What Future for Palestine” Forum held in Rome


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21 April 2024

The October 7th operation and the battles which have followed have proved that the Palestinian resistance has strengthened its military capacity and achieved broad political unity. All armed groups are now cooperating together from a common base of resistance. The resistance struggles against the Zionist regime which is armed and funded by the United States and other Western countries. Outnumbered and outgunned, the Palestinian resistance has inflicted serious loses to the enemy. The Zionists have been forced to continue operations in Gaza for more than 6 months without achieving their initial or intermediate goals. The Zionist regime has left behind more than 40,000 dead or missing persons, including 14,000 children with over 80,000 seriously wounded. Civilian infrastructure in Gaza has been systematically targeted and destroyed.

Today, the resistance remains on the battlefield while the Zionists are in retreat. This is not a victory for the Zionists but a massive political, economic, and social defeat. The true nature of Zionism has been revealed for all the world to see. Zionism can only be maintained with massacres, war crimes, crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, and genocide. Now, for many around the world, Zionists are seen as not only colonizers but their crimes and actions are akin to the Nazis.

Within the imperialist framework, the United States and its vassals have decided to go to war on three fronts. The first front is in Ukraine, where the US, NATO, and its proxies are confronting Russia. The second front is in West Asia, where the Zionist regime, with the backing of the Western imperialists, is fighting the resistance axis. The third front is in East Asia, where the United States and its regional allies seek to confront China through Taiwan and the South China Sea and the DPRK through South Korea. Under the Biden administration, the US has escalated conflicts around the world, destroying peaceful solutions like the Istanbul agreement for Ukraine and the revival of the JCPOA for Iran, as well as the increasing sanctions on Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Russia, Iran, and numerous other countries. As is abundantly clear, the same block of Western states is behind all three conflicts, the only difference being their selection of local proxies.

The current escalation in West Asia is in line with the US wars against all the independent states in the region since the 1990s when George H.W. Bush declared the US plan for a new Middle East. Practically, this meant the destruction of any state that did not obey the unipolar world order under US hegemony. One by one, the United States targeted and destroyed Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, and staged the coup in Egypt. They destroyed the states and killed millions in the process, but they failed to destroy the resistance. This is the failure of their Middle East policy.

The West targets the Islamic Republic of Iran. The recent escalations and the killing of nearly 18 Iranian officers and officials since the beginning of the year led to Iran’s massive military response which shocked the Zionist regime. While the flare up has settled at this point, provocations and escalations will continue as the West, through its Zionist project, seeks the destruction of Iran.

There are two critical points we must note:

1. War is the sole method for the United States to maintain its hegemony and the unipolar world. The US is well aware that they cannot remain the foremost economic, technological, and cultural power. Thus, in order to continue to control the world, the US has no alternative but to resort to violence. The US seeks to destroy the emerging poles of the international multipolar system by opening multiple fronts of war.

2. The US and its proxies will not hesitate to commit any heinous crime, including genocide, to maintain their power. From the genocide in Gaza to the mass murder of civilians in Russia, the West will stop at nothing to ensure that they continue to violently remake the world in their image. Thus, the West is the real threat for humanity and human civilization. Only a defeat will end their barbaric crimes.

These two points guide the Zionist regimes current plans in Palestine. When the Zionist plan to expel Gaza’s residents failed, Netanyahu announced a new plan for Gaza. This new plan forces Palestinians to live in tents, within a sealed enclave under constant bombardment with limited access to food, water, power, medical care, and education. The Zionists prior to October 7th even scientifically calculated the caloric intake of each Palestinian to control the amount of food and “put Gaza on a diet.” Living conditions continue to decline and the Palestinian people are slowly being driven to their death en masse.

In the West Bank, Palestinians are subjected to raids, killings, and pogroms by settlers who murder with impunity. It is within this horrible situation that created the conditions that led to Al-Aqsa flood on October 7th. For Palestinians, they are left with the choice of living in ever smaller Bantustans or struggling for their resistance by any means necessary.

We must deepen the struggle against the United States, the European Union, NATO, the Zionist regime, and their proxies. We must continue to educate the people and, for those in EU and NATO states, we must persuade the people that leaving the EU and NATO will lead to a more just and peaceful world. We must struggle to close US bases in our countries. We must increase our anti-imperialist and antiwar activities and actions. Palestine will be free when Western imperialism and Zionism are defeated. Our contribution to the Palestinian resistance is our continuing struggle both at home and abroad to defeat US-EU-NATO imperialism and Zionism.

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