In September of this year, the 5th World Conference of the ICOR pointed out the rapid, often unpredictable changes and also revolutionary developments in the world. As a result of the instability of the imperialist world system with multiple crises and changing power relations, we find ourselves in the midst of a time of major developments in which decades of conditions are overturned within a few days.

As our main coordinator correctly introduced in the opening of the 5th World Conference, “the imperialist world system is plunging humanity into life-threatening crises that threaten its very existence: a growing tendency towards fascism, the danger of a third world war and the beginning of a global environmental catastrophe. They present humanity with the historical alternative: downfall in imperialist barbarism or forward to socialism and communism, despite all the difficulties.” The developments of the past year alone confirm our apt analyses. A brief look at the Middle East will suffice:

Genocide and war in Gaza and Lebanon

Developments since October 7, 2023 have changed the entire region. The Palestinian liberation struggle has returned to the global consciousness of progressive humanity and decades of Zionist oppression have once again been exposed. The extent of the developments extends far beyond the region. The Palestinian question polarizes the entire world and challenges bourgeois democracy, because in many countries with unrestricted support for Israel, solidarity with the Palestinian liberation struggle is met with state violence, repression, dismantling of rights and arbitrariness. Any solidarity is legitimate and absolutely necessary, because the consequences of the genocide and ecocide in Palestine and Lebanon are dramatic and symbolize the abysses of colonial and imperialist aggression in the region. The war against the Palestinian people in all parts of Palestine has assumed a scale of destruction that surpasses many historical experiences. Gaza has become a testing ground for the technologized genocide and warfare of the 21st century.

With the election of the fascist Donald Trump as US president, an open opponent of the Palestinian freedom issue has taken over as head of the world's main warmongering state, who will be in no way inferior to his predecessor Joe Biden. The Abraham negotiations and the relocation of the US embassy to Jerusalem, which he pushed for during his previous term of office, were far-reaching attacks on the Palestinian people.

In unwavering cooperation with Israel, which is a counter-revolutionary center and mainstay of Western imperialism in the region, the genocide in Gaza has been extended to Lebanon and the Zionist aggression and occupation attacks have been regionalized. The fascist genocidal Netanyahu government is using its technological and military superiority for a total escalation of the war it is waging, which is strategically directed against its main regional adversary Iran. Even temporary ceasefire agreements should not obscure this fact. The occupation and violent colonization of Lebanon and other parts of the Levant up to the Sinai has been the goal of the Zionists for decades.

The Zionist attacks on large parts of Lebanon under the guise of the fight against Hezbollah, which responded to the genocide in Gaza with numerous rocket attacks on northern Israel, have created a humanitarian emergency situation. The already crisis-ridden country became the scene of merciless, cold-blooded experiments that had been planned for years, such as the “pager attack” against Hezbollah on September 17, 2024, which affected over 3,000 people throughout Lebanon. The ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon entered into on November 27 under US pressure is only a delay in a war of wills that will be fought to the bitter end.

In view of these developments, the 5th World Conference decided on a decisive direction: “All ICOR organizations present agreed on the full support of the Palestinian Liberation Struggle with a revolutionary-democratic perspective on the way to socialism. The common ground and the joint practical solidarity was not blocked by the differences yet to resolve."

Arab Gulf: The Arab bourgeoisie collaborates with US imperialism

However, the current conflicts are not limited to the Levant. The Houthis in Yemen represent another force of the so-called resistance axis supported by Iran, which is fighting against Zionism. The war in Yemen broke out in 2014 after the Houthis took over the capital Sanaa. Saudi Arabia and later the UAE intervened in the war to push back Iran's influence. The victims of these attacks are the 2.5 million Yemenis who live in extreme poverty and are defencelessly exposed to indiscriminate airstrikes.

The Saudi royal family, together with the UAE, is one of the most important allies of US imperialism. Even if the actors in the region are the most diverse representatives of political Islam, we must not forget that they represent very different and also contrary interests, some of which are waging national struggles. The different analyses of the ICOR members on the forces in the region can be the subject of the 2nd issue of the Palestine journal planned by the 5th World Conference. A deeper analysis of the historical and current role of US-American and British imperialism in particular in initiating, financing, controlling and instrumentalizing reactionary anti-communist political-Islamist actors according to their interests is useful in order to be able to assess the forces in the region. The developments in Syria once again point to this necessity.

North Africa: the hinterland of war

As the largest of the Arab countries and the link between Asia and Africa, Egypt has a major influence on developments in the region. In the military regime under the dictator al-Sisi, which collaborates with Zionism and imperialism, political freedom has been abolished and, as in almost all countries in North Africa and the Middle East, the Arab popular uprising has been stolen in the country. Nevertheless, under the pressure of far too much national debt and the regime's wasteful construction policy, workers' protests are on the rise again, such as earlier this year when 7,000 workers went on strike for better wages in Ghazl al-Mahalla. These workers' struggles have the potential to tear a crack through the wall of oppression and pave the way for social struggles.

On the other side, in the northwest of the continent, there is a close partnership between the reactionary Moroccan monarchy and US imperialism and Zionism. It cooperates militarily with Israel and, with the annexation of Western Sahara, holds the last “classic colony” in Africa under its yoke. Despite the repression, a large movement developed in Morocco against the normalization of relations with Israel. One million people demonstrated for Palestine, a clear expression of solidarity!

Another close partner of Zionism is the Jordanian monarchy on the Asian continent. But within the country there is a dynamic of its own, based on the fact that well over half of all people living in Jordan have Palestinian roots and have been mobilizing since 7 October.

The bourgeois Algerian state, in turn, plays an important role in holding back the influence of Israel in Africa. Together with South Africa, they have been preventing Israel's admission to the African Union for years. As more and more African comrades explained in various discussions, e.g. at the 5th World Conference or the Lenin Seminar of the PPDS in Tunisia, the influence of Zionism in Africa and the world is an important issue that needs to be investigated and exposed.

Turkey and the war against Kurdistan and Syria

With inflation at over 85%, a social crisis has also deepened in Turkey, accompanied by a political tightening of conditions. Since 2015, the NATO state has been waging an open war against the revolutionary-democratic forces in the country, a war that is being waged both internally and externally. Attacks against working people, women, the Kurdish people and Syrian refugees are the order of the day. Erdogan's political Islamist fascism aims to create a cemetery peace in the country, to crush the Kurdish national freedom struggle together with the revolutionary movement and to extend the Turkish state borders to the Misak-ı Millî borders of the Ottoman Empire. As an occupying war power, they develop their military technology and act militarily in the region as well as in Africa.

Turkish fascism is partly responsible for the dramatic developments in Syria. On November 28, 2024, troops of the Islamist HTS began a coordinated offensive with the Turkish-controlled Syrian National Army (SNA) against the Assad regime and the self-administration of northern and eastern Syria, which had been planned for a year. Israel also supported the advance by bombing 500 Syrian army positions and occupying further territory.

The statement of the ICOR states:

“The march of HTS shows that the masses, including even military, have withdrawn all support from Assad. That is also the price he had to pay because his regime also brutally oppressed ethnic/national and religious minorities. Russia, in its strategy for power-political influence in the region, abandoned Syria, not least because of its concentration of forces in Ukraine. Assad fled to Moscow to his close ally. The capital Damascus and other Syrian cities were taken militarily by an alliance led by the Islamist HTS (Hayat Tahrir al-Sham) within two weeks. It has roots in Al-Qaeda and is connected to the Jabhat al-Nusra and operates with Erdogan in the background. But the new power holders are also welcomed as “good news” from the US and the EU. This is a reaction to the weakening of the influence especially of Iran and Russia in Syria, which are strongly committed in Ukraine and Lebanon. Immediately after the fall of Assad, troops of Zionist Israel occupied the border zone with Syria, opening a “fourth front”. All this underscores the fact that this is by no means an internal Syrian conflict, but an intensification of the contradictions between imperialist blocs and reactionary, fascist powers of all kinds. The joy of the masses at the overthrow of Assad cannot hide the fact that a democratic people's government has by no means been established. If the HTS presents itself as purified by its break with Al Qaeda and ISIS, we are reminded of the initial assertions of the Taliban in Afghanistan. Their fascist rule is now worse and more misogynistic than ever. But in part, such forces apparently also find themselves forced to present a more moderate course in order to keep or extend their mass base. Above all, however, the struggle for power and influence in Syria and the Middle East between various imperialist and other reactionary, fascist forces will intensify.”

For the peoples, especially the women of Syria, above all in the democratic autonomy of North and East Syria, a very dangerous time is beginning, in which the conditions for the coming attacks are maturing. The developments in Syria benefit the Zionist warmongers, US imperialism and Turkish fascism, while creating more chaos and uncertainty for the workers and oppressed who were in revolt with legitimate aspirations for freedom.

Iran, an oppressive regime that violently attacks the legitimate freedom aspirations of its peoples, forms a counter-pole against Israel and US imperialism in the region. The developments since October 7 show what a weakened and passive situation Iran finds itself in. The dynamics of another popular uprising in Iran still exist, the rift between the people and the state is deeper than ever, the workers continue to struggle. Meanwhile, the conditions for attacks and interventions by US imperialism and Israel against Iran are drawing ever closer. The developments in Syria show that the region's power structure is very fragile and that further far-reaching developments are imminent in the coming times. It can be assumed that the region will be one of the three main theaters of armed conflict in the overall development towards a third imperialist world war.

Perspectives

The Middle East is in a deep political crisis due to its dependence on imperialism, lack of political freedom, unresolved national issues and religious and sectarian conflicts. This multidimensional reality exists in a context in which the development of imperialism has created significant changes, the petty bourgeois class has been increasingly dispossessed, women's labour has been increasingly incorporated into social production, and urbanization and the growing number of students have further challenged material conditions. From whatever perspective you look at it, the situation in the Middle East is highly dynamic, unstable and crisis-ridden. It is clear that various elements of the crises in the Middle East are becoming ever stronger. The Arab popular uprisings of 2011 transformed the political crisis into a revolutionary crisis. In this revolutionary crisis, the influence of imperialist and reactionary powers has created permanent war situations.

The position of the ICOR in this complicated web of various imperialist and reactionary interventions, interests and struggles is to represent the demands, aspirations and concerns of the working and oppressed, the peoples, the women, the youth and not to pander to any bourgeois camp.

Only the union of the peoples and their mobilization for their interests represent a solution. To this end, we must strengthen the meeting and exchange with the democratic and revolutionary representatives of the peoples of the region. The ICOR has a forward-looking role to play here.

The decision of the 5th World Conference to anchor the Middle East region in the organizational structure of the ICOR forms an effective basis on which we can react to the developments. The 5th World Conference has given us important perspectives and impulses in this respect:

1. the preparation of the next Middle East Conference

2. unwavering solidarity with the Palestinian liberation struggle

3. preparing resolutions on developments in the region

4. organize discussions on imperialism and fascism in relation to our region

5. develop their practical cooperation and collaboration and organize offensive campaigns on the developments

6. make the Gaza hospital project a success.

7. publish the 2nd issue of the online magazine on Palestine.

Today's 1st meeting of the 1st Middle East Coordination of ICOR has a founding character and will clarify the working methods and function of the region in ICOR.

It will apply the perspectives of the 5th World Conference to its region and organize discussions within the ICOR about the region.

In this spirit we open the discussion and send solidarity greetings to the revolutionary forces of the region.