No to the attack on Iran – Killer US, Killer Israel
Following weeks of US military buildup in the Persian Gulf and the countries surrounding Iran, the US and Israel have launched an attack on Iran. First, the Israeli Defense Minister announced they had launched “preemptive strikes”. Subsequently, Trump announced the start of a “major operation to prevent the regime in Iran from threatening America.”
Trump shamelessly addressed the Iranian people: “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.” Iran responded to these attacks by simultaneously striking US bases in several countries across the region and Israel. The clashes instantly spread across the entire Gulf region.
Israel, which has been committing genocide in Palestine since October 2023 and has killed 72,000 Gazans—over 20,000 of whom are children—is putting forward a pretext we have known since 2002. George W. Bush tried to legitimize the US invasion of Iraq with the doctrine of preemptive war. Now, Israel is hiding behind the same doctrine, making the hollow claim that if they do not attack Iran, Iran will attack them.
The US, which invaded Iraq in 2003, is fundamentally responsible for all the instability in the region. Its watchdog, Israel, acting like an advanced outpost, is a rogue state that has attacked almost every country in the region in the last 26 months, carrying out assassinations against the leaders of various organizations.
Trump is telling two lies at the same time. He claims both that Iran is threatening the US, and also that he ordered the attack because Iran is attempting to rebuild its nuclear program. In Iraq too, the US launched the invasion that tore the country apart and destroyed hundreds of thousands of lives under the lie that Saddam Hussein’s regime was producing weapons of mass destruction. After the invasion, it was revealed that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction; this was a fabricated lie to legitimize the US decision to invade.
Democracy has never been the concern of the US, neither yesterday nor today. Just as the US did not care about the Iraqi people, neither can it care about the Iranian people. Trump is an authoritarian right-winger who inflicts immense suffering on his own people and supports the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) forces that brutalize civilians.
At various points in history the US has attacked various countries around the world, claiming that they were producing weapons of mass destruction, and then laid waste, bombed and inflicted great suffering on those countries. Yet it is the US, the holder of the biggest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction, that is the most dangerous power in the world. The US has a total of 5,177 nuclear warheads, 1,770 of which are active on missiles and at bomber bases. The whole world is under the threat of thousands of nuclear bombs ready for use under the command of a right-winger like Trump who thinks he is a king. Similarly, it is estimated that Israel possesses 90 nuclear warheads.
If the world is to be purged of weapons of mass destruction, it must start with the US and Israel.
We know that the fundamental issue for the US is to re-establish its declining imperialist hegemony and to succeed in its ongoing global competition with China.
The US wants to prove itself as the master of the 21st century, and has also been using NATO to do so since the organization’s intervention in the Kosovo war. By striking Iran, it is also once again challenging China and Russia. For Israel, every step toward war taken by the US provides ample room to deepen the genocidal policy it maintains in Palestine and the region.
We, as those fighting against the ongoing genocide in Palestine, demand an immediate end to the US-Israeli military aggression against Iran. Turkey must end all its military cooperation with the US and declare that it stands by those who are oppressed, attacked, and subjected to genocide.
Just as no plan of Trump’s can be accepted, his Gaza Plan is also unacceptable.
In the speech where he announced ordering the attack, Trump invited the Iranian people to overthrow the regime after the bombardment.
US imperialism, which is both murderous and shameless, is also trying to hijack the freedom struggle of the peoples living in the region. It is trying to tarnish the Iranian people’s struggle against the tyranny of the Iranian regime. Freedom in Iran will be won not with US-Israeli bombs, but through the struggle of the working class from below. As the war shows signs of spreading in the region, it is of vital importance for workers in Turkey and all countries to take action and form the center of the struggle against the war. Freedom in the region will come through the struggle of the workers; only mass workers’ movements can stop the war. We must build a movement similar to the one formed by the millions of people who took to the streets against the invasion of Iraq in 2003. From Gaza to Iran to Minneapolis, we stand with the oppressed.
No to the US-Israeli war on Iran!
Turkey out of NATO!
Close the US bases!
Do not be a part of Trump’s Gaza Plan!
Trump, hands off Iran!
