The positive news in recent days is the sudden increase in numbers at the “for Gaza” demonstrations in Genoa and Venice. In Genoa, tens of thousands, in Lido Venice, a few thousand. Although the solidarity movement with the Palestinian people remains significantly behind in Italy compared to Great Britain, France, and Greece, something is shifting towards greater participation.

What has caused this change?

The factor of primary importance was the exterminating action of the Netanyahu government and the IDF which went beyond all limits in terms of ferocity. Despite the systematic slaughter of journalists, the Zionist killing machine has failed to cover up its crimes. Nor has it been able to prevent that, over time, they will be unbearable to many, especially when the famine intentionally caused and the massacres of people in search of food have been added to the bombings. This obscene spectacle has generated in a wider social area than usual the desire, and even the urgency, to say: stop genocide! And to say it in the squares.

This enlargement is welcome. It was about time! There is a great delay to make up. For two years we have struggled like mules to get people to accept that genocide was taking place in Gaza; to make it clear that it comes from afar (not since 7 October); and, even more, to make people understand that terrorism is all and only on the side of the colonial, supremacist, racist state of Israel, and of those – like the Italian state and government – which supply and support it. Both for Genoa and Venice and for the whole of Italy we claim to have been among the few to move immediately, defying, even in solitude, the apparatus of the mass media granitically lined up on the side of the state of Israel, to sow the seeds of internationalist class solidarity, not only with the Palestinian people, but also with the Palestinian resistance (it is not the same thing). We also claim to have carried out, together with the SI Cobas, the organizer of the most significant strikes for Palestine, and with the most militant part of the Palestinian associations, an action aimed at hitting Zionist interests, the Italian companies supplying arms to Israel, to block – unfortunately only in part – some ports, to fuel the boycott campaign of Israeli products, to support those militants who have been targeted for their solidarity with the Palestinian cause.

This incessant activity, ours and those (organizations and individuals) who feel the cause of the national and social liberation of the Palestinians as their own cause, kept the attention on what was happening in Palestine and in the Middle East. In this way we have ploughed the ground for the expansion of the mobilization. But we were able to do it, in turn, thanks to the extraordinary strength of the Palestinian resistance, which has summoned the squares around the world (especially silent ones in Russia, China, Egypt, and other Arab countries) to shout loudly against Israel and its iron allies, the United States / NATO / European Union. We have never ceased to call into question the Meloni government, Leonardo, Fincantieri, and the mass media machinery of pro-Zionist lies, often in a hard isolation to endure – produced also by those who today claim that ‘it can no longer be denied that this is genocide’ (a year ago, why did you deny it?).

Welcome, then, to the squares of Genoa and Venice, which are much more participated than usual! We finally have a broader audience, largely youthful and female, with whom to interact – a still limited mass, but one that is beginning to shake off apathy and resignation.

But not all that glitters is gold: this applies both to the squares and to the Global Sumud Flotilla.

In both Genoa and Venice, in fact, the organizational commitment has been evident, and let’s say it frankly: the leadership, of sectors of the Democratic Party, the CGIL, Catholic associations, the area around AVS (Alliance Green-Left), and the forces that are gathering in the center-left opposition to the right-wing government, have stepped onto the field – we’re talking about the apparatuses – with aims that have little or nothing to do with genuine solidarity for Palestine.

What drives these forces is something else. First of all, the awareness that there is a feeling of repulsion, of horror towards the actions of the Netanyahu government in society today, which could even evolve into militant support for the cause of Palestinian liberation – and this would go against the interests of Italian capitalism and the Italian state, which are tied by a thousand threads to Israel. For Schlein, Conte, Landini, the worthless champions of AVS and their lackeys, the maturation of this humanitarian sentiment towards true solidarity with the oppressed of Palestine is a danger to be thwarted. After a long, shameful silence, they are now stepping forward to cautiously assume representation of it. An electoral and propaganda card against the Meloni government, which is much more aligned than they are with the Washington-Tel Aviv axis. A wink to the residual liberal Zionism present in Israel and, above all, the proposal for a more autonomous role for Europe from the United States in the ‘Palestinian issue’ (and in general).

Yes, the growing friction between the European Union and the United States is also behind some timid steps by the ‘left’ in Europe and some European governments (Spain, France, U.K.) to distance themselves from the current direction of the state of Israel and Trump: see the grotesque recognition of the ‘Palestinian state’, after having allowed for decades for the Zionist forces to make it materially impossible. These forces seek to reduce the negative impact of the actions of the Zionist state on Europe, and particularly on Italy, by marking a supposed diversity between the two. We Italians-Europeans are good guys…

There are also those, like the Five Star Movement of Conte, who go further and envision a Europe that partially rejects the rush to war, positioning itself – even in the war between NATO and Russia in Ukraine – for ‘peace’, for negotiations, for a diplomatic solution to all ongoing military conflicts. And, without exposing themselves too much, they hint that it would be useful for Italy and Europe to mend commercial and ‘friendship’ relations with Russia, China, and the Brics. So, when the forces that we have seen at the forefront of the mass demonstration in Genoa or the ‘pacifist’ alliance in Brussels say ‘for Gaza’, it must be understood as: for Italy, for Europe. It is no coincidence that Salis, the newly elected Pd mayor of Genoa, claims that this coalition embodies true patriotism, in contrast to the ‘shouted but not practiced’ nationalism of the Meloni government…

Equally ambiguous is the initiative of the Global Sumud Flotilla. There is no doubt: it helps to socialize on a larger scale the existence of an ongoing genocide. As Dalia Ismail wrote, it can even be considered, in this sense, ‘fundamental: not because it represents all of us, but because it forces the hypocritical, lagging, and distracted part of the world to look at the genocide.’ This falls, moreover, at a time when the Washington-Tel Aviv axis is unleashed in completing the total destruction of Gaza City. Thus, the disruptive effect is certain. And there could be very harsh Zionist reactions against this expedition: Ben Gvir’s announcement (‘we will treat them as terrorists’) suggests this. For these reasons, and because in Barcelona, in Genoa, in Athens there has been a mass attention towards this ‘enterprise’, we will follow its development with full participation. We stand with the Sumud Flotilla.

But this does not prevent us from seeing the heavy critical aspects of this initiative. As much as the likable Greta Thunberg denies it (‘the Palestinians do not need us to come save them’), all the propaganda surrounding it is in the name of ‘white saviours‘. As in the demonstrations in Genoa and Venice, no space has been given to the Palestinians. And even less to their extraordinary resistance. The Palestinians are the victims who need our generous help, not the collective subject capable, for 80 years, of standing up to one of the most powerful, equipped, and funded armies in the world. Palestinian martyrdom is not the tip of the iceberg of Zionist settlement colonialism and Western imperialism’s actions in the Middle East, but a ‘humanitarian’ issue to be dealt with NGOs and the donation of aid.

Ismail continues: ‘The problem is a world order that condemns Palestinians to silence and marginality, even when they are talked about.’ Sometimes even worse happens: at the press conference with the president of the Biennale in Venice, the spokesperson for Pax Christi did not fail to talk about the ‘terrorists’ of Hamas…

That said, the initiative of the Sumud Flotilla is in any case determining a clear expansion of the mobilization in more European countries, with a real internationalist potential. Beyond the intentions of its organizers, it relaunched the need for an active and militant solidarity with the Palestinian people against the Zionist butchers, for a real struggle against European governments and institutional political forces – including those who today aspire to regain their virginity, but always, in the name of Israel’s “security needs”, They support the Zionist colonial occupation with all its horrors, including genocide.

Now the Global Sumud Flotilla is facing a big unknown, probably underestimated: what will the Netanyahu government do? “If they touch one of ours, we block Italy, we block Europe!”, we have heard more than one say, in Venice and Genoa. And here returns, despite the laudable intention of struggle, which we share, the white brand (“ours”…) that we criticize instead. We know both ports well, having demonstrated in front of us and inside. And, in order not to tell lies to the unsuspecting public, we must admit that we have never been able to stop the port of Venice (even when there was a ship suspected of carrying weapons – a garrison is not a blockade of the port). As for the one in Genoa, the only day of partial effective blockade was that of June 25 last year – of which we were an active part.

To give life to a strike capable of seriously affecting capitalist interests and the arms business in favor of the Zionist butchers, it is not enough to proclaim it: it is necessary to do hard work to raise awareness and activate the mass of workers, who until now have remained largely at the window in the face of genocide. The four general strikes called so far by SI Cobas in almost total solitude, which we have supported with conviction, show us that at least in the most combative sectors of the working class (as in the case of logistics) we are not exactly at year zero…

That is why we positively welcome these intentions to finally take action with the weapon of strike and the blockade of goods, noting that a commitment in this direction must be made regardless of the outcome of the mission to Gaza. Because even if, as we hope, the boats of the Sumud Flotilla were to pass unscathed through the blockade set up by Netanyahu and the IDF killers and even manage to deliver essential goods to the people of Gaza, the extermination of Palestinians will not stop. And it is to stop the genocide and to defeat the colonialist occupation machine that the increasing forces at our disposal must be directed and channelled – with a real general strike aimed primarily at blocking maritime traffic directed to Israel, coordinated on a national and international scale. The initiatives in recent months at various European ports show that this goal is, at least in part, feasible: provided that all components of combatant trade unionism (located anywhere) unite their forces for this purpose, putting aside any logic of primogeniture and marketing.

As far as we are concerned, we are and will be in the square in support of the Flotilla, against any acts of intimidation and repression by the Zionist state and army. To reaffirm, as always, the unconditional defence of the Palestinian people and resistance, the first among us, the end of Zionist occupation, for a Palestine free from the river to the sea, to build an international front capable of battling capitalism, its horrors, and its wars everywhere.