At the first session of the 23rd International Communist and Workers’ Parties Meeting held today, a declaration was published with the joint support of all participating parties, demanding an immediate stop to Israel’s massacres in Gaza and inviting all the peoples of the world to fight for the Palestinian people. In the declaration, which called on people all over the world to continue to take to the streets to fight and to mobilize against Israeli aggression, the barbaric genocide carried out by Israel in the Gaza Strip was condemned. The declaration underlines that Israel is supported by the USA and NATO and requests “ending the Israeli occupation, establishing and recognizing an independent Palestinian state, stopping and removing illegal settlements in Palestinian lands, releasing prisoners in Israeli prisons, returning refugees in accordance with UN resolution 194.”.
A total of 123 delegates from 68 parties and organizations from 54 countries attended the meeting hosted by the Communist Party of Turkey in Izmir. The meeting started with the opening speech of TKP General Secretary Kemal Okuyan, following a moment of silence for the Palestinian people who lost their lives in Israeli attacks. The meeting will end on Sunday.
The full text of the declaration is as follows:
The parties participating in the 23rd International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties (IMCWP) held in Izmir, Turkey, 19-22 October 2023:
1. We demand that Israel’s aggression and blockade on the Gaza Strip and the West Bank stop now. We call on the people to continue to take to the streets to struggle, to organize popular mobilizations against Israeli aggression all around the world.
We express our full solidarity with the Palestinian people and condemn the brutal military offensive, the inhuman blockade and the barbarous genocide by the Israel in the Gaza Strip, with thousands of dead civilians, children and elderly, deprived of food, water, medicine and electricity. We denounce the support of the USA, Britain, NATO and the EU for the Israeli offensive.
2. We condemn the decade-long Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, the killings, imprisonment, persecution and settlements. We defend the right of the Palestinian people to a free homeland, to be masters of their own land. We demand an end to the Israeli occupation, the creation and recognition of an independent Palestinian state, the cessation and dismantling of the illegal settlements in the Palestinian territories, the release of prisoners from Israeli jails, the return of refugees in accordance with UN resolution 194.
The occupation of Palestine by Israel, supported by US-NATO imperialism, is the source of the suffering of the Palestinian people, and all the peoples of the region. As long as the occupation continues, the conflicts will continue, the peoples will be prevented from living in peace, they will be in danger of being caught in the vortex of a generalised war.
3. The Communist and Workers’ Parties participating in the 23rd IMCWP, express their internationalist solidarity and call upon the workers, the peoples, the youth, in all countries to strengthen the struggle to stop the massacre in the Gaza Strip and end the occupation of Palestine by Israel to express decisive solidarity with the just struggle of the Palestinian people.