The ceasefire agreement between the Palestinian Resistance Movement Hamas and Israel came into effect on the morning of 19 January, 2025.
For fifteen months on end, Israel, with the military and political backing of US imperialism, has carried on a genocidal war against the Palestinian people. In the course of this genocidal war, Israel has committed unforgivable crimes against the Palestinian people. Over 50,000 men, women and children living in the Gaza strip have been massacred. Lakhs of people have suffered grievous injuries. The vast majority of the population of Gaza was forcibly displaced from their homes. They have been forced into starvation. Their homes, schools, hospitals and places of worship have been reduced to rubble. Undaunted in the face of this genocidal war, the Palestinian people have continued their heroic struggle for their very existence as a people.
This latest war launched by Israel against the Palestinian people has been one of the longest and most brutal wars against the Palestinian people since the state of Israel came into existence in 1948. Its aim was to destroy the Palestinian resistance forces who have never given up the struggle for a free Palestine. Israel and its US backers have failed in their effort. The cease fire agreement that Israel and the US have been forced to make with Hamas is proof of this failure.
Over the past fifteen months, the struggle of the Palestinian people for their national rights has won the support of the entire humankind. Resistance forces in the occupied Gaza and West Bank, Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Iran have shown through their deeds that nothing can halt the struggle for a free Palestine. Throughout the world — in the US, Britain, Canada, Germany, France, Spain and other European countries, in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America, crores of people have come onto the streets, again and again, demanding an end to Israel’s genocidal war. They have condemned the arming of Israel by the US and other governments. They have demanded an end to the occupation of Palestine.
The ceasefire agreement has an initial six week phase during which the Palestinian resistance in Gaza will release 33 Israelis in exchange for Israel releasing 737 Palestinian women and children incarcerated in the torture chambers of Israel. During the second phase, the remaining Israeli captives will be released. The final phase is expected to center on rebuilding Gaza.
Following the ceasefire, Israel has been forced to end its reign of terror in Gaza. Lakhs of people who were forcibly displaced from their homes have begun returning to the ruins of what was once their home. The first lot of Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli jails, the majority of them women and children, have come out to a rousing welcome from the people.
It must be noted that Israel is continuing with its plans of forcibly taking over the lands of the Palestinian people in the occupied West Bank. The Israeli army has unleashed a reign of terror in the West Bank, killing people in various refugee camps and driving people out of their lands. The new Trump government has announced that it will step up the arming of Israel. It has lifted the sanctions on Israeli settlers who are forcibly taking over the lands of the Palestinian people in the West Bank. The resistance fighters in the West Bank are heroically fighting back the attacks of the Israeli occupation forces.
Over the past fifteen months, the Palestinian people have shown to the whole world their indomitable spirit, and their determination to continue the struggle, no matter what sacrifices it entails, to end the Israeli occupation of their homeland.
The Communist Ghadar Party of India salutes the heroic Palestinian people and their just struggle. The people of India are one with the Palestinian people in this struggle.