· for ousting Hamas in Gaza
· for replacing the Netanyahu government with a democratic regime
On Saturday, October 7th, a crime against humanity was committed in southern Israel. Armed members of Hamas invaded homes and massacred families. At the International Nature and Peace Festival in Re’im Forest, they killed hundreds. In all, more than a thousand civilians were murdered in cold blood. Thousands more were injured. Over a hundred, including infants, children, women, disabled, and elderly were dragged into Gaza as hostages. Women were raped. Women were also displayed in the streets of Gaza and on media platforms.
These horrific acts were not committed by people whose rationality had been warped by the prolonged Israeli siege on Gaza. It was a well-planned and well-organized deed perpetrated by more than a thousand armed men, loyal to a terrorist organization funded by Qatar and the Iranian Ayatollah regime.
Hamas took control of Gaza in 2007 in a violent coup against the Palestinian Authority (PA). Since then, it has established its rule over that devastated strip of land, holding Gazans hostage to its fundamentalist ambitions. Ironically, Israel under Netanyahu sought to strengthen Hamas, reasoning that it would weaken the PA and reduce pressure on Israel to negotiate peace.
In January 2023, Netanyahu’s sixth government was formed, with key positions granted to extreme and fascist elements. Since its establishment, it has worked towards one goal: to eliminate the independence of the judicial system, removing this obstacle to annexing the West Bank. In parallel, the government negotiated economic steps with Hamas, thus recognizing it as the legitimate ruler of Gaza.
Against Netanyahu’s attempt to turn Israel into a dictatorial and halakhic state, an unprecedented protest movement has emerged, involving hundreds of thousands. This movement, which has raised the banner of democracy for all, opposes the settler-controlled apartheid regime in the West Bank. The conflict between the protest movement and the Netanyahu government reached its peak when thousands of reservists, pilots, and senior officers declared that they would refuse to serve in the army if Israel became a dictatorship.
The massacre carried out on October 7 in the southern communities of Israel exposed Hamas for what it is: not a liberation movement, not freedom fighters, but an organization of fanatics, twin to ISIS, spreading death and chaos.
Simultaneously, the failures of the Netanyahu government were exposed in all their breadth. His full-scale rightwing coalition talked big about security but abandoned its citizens in the hour of need, having shifted most of the army to the West Bank to protect settlers.
MAAN Workers Association joins US President Joe Biden and the democratic camp worldwide in calling for the elimination of the Hamas regime in Gaza and the threat it poses to Israelis and Palestinians.
After this task is accomplished, we will continue to work with hundreds of thousands of Israelis who have sworn to remove Netanyahu and his extremist partners from the Israeli political scene. We and the rest of the protest movement will strive to build a new democratic alternative in Israel, one that will provide hope for both Israelis and Palestinians, promoting sanity and peace.
As an organization that includes in its ranks both Israelis and Palestinians, MAAN opposes the voices that lump all Palestinians with Hamas and call for the flattening of Gaza. It is essential to distinguish between Hamas and the Palestinian people who have been suffocating under Israeli occupation. The just war against Hamas must be conducted while upholding international law, which prohibits harm to civilians.
The order of the day is to fight simultaneously against both Hamas and the Netanyahu-Smotrich-Ben Gvir alliance. It is a battle against religious extremism on both sides, in which the fanaticism of one fuels that of the other. Neither represents its people, who in each case yearn for peace and security.
