Europe marks International Day of Solidarity with Palestine
This article by Ana Vračar republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.
On November 29, hundreds of thousands marched across Europe in support of Palestine and against government complicity in Israel’s genocide.
The Palestine solidarity movement in Europe again brought record numbers to the streets on the UN’s International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, November 29, reaffirming demands for an end to government complicity in the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the occupation of Palestine. Hundreds of thousands marched across the region, with demonstrations in London and Rome each reaching an estimated 100,000 participants.
“On this day, people around the world express their support for the inalienable rights that are currently denied to Palestinians: the right to live free from discrimination, the right to self-determination, and the right to return to their lands,” the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) wrote on social media. “Despite this Britain continues to arm Israel and refuses to implement meaningful sanctions or end its diplomatic support. It still provides parts for Israel’s F-35 fighter jets, used to bomb Palestinians in Gaza and maintains contracts with Israeli weapons manufacturers like Elbit Systems.”
Read more: Protests continue as court prepares to review Palestine Action ban
Saturday’s demonstration was the 33rd national march for Palestine in Britain. In addition to local activists, it also welcomed international guests who have stood with Palestinians since the beginning of the genocide, including Belgian MEP Marc Botenga of the Workers’ Party of Belgium (PTB-PVDA), French parliamentarian Nadège Abomangoli of France Unbowed (LFI), and Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald. While addressing the crowd in London, they emphasized the internationalist character of the mobilization and echoed demands that could be heard in their home countries around the same time.
As thousands marched in Paris and Dublin, they insisted on the need to continue organizing despite political obstruction and attacks. Irish actor Liam Cunningham, a vocal supporter of Palestine, helped lead Dublin’s demonstration. Responding to artists being de-platformed for speaking out against genocide, he said: “If anyone doesn’t want to employ me because I’ve taken a stand against injustice, against the refusal to give self-determination to a group of people who are politically, culturally on the same track that my country was on for 800 years […] they’re not going to be very good at their job, because they’ve no soul.”
Another recurring message across Europe refused the mainstream media allegation of a “ceasefire” in Gaza. “There’s no ceasefire just because it’s written on a Western media banner,” Cunningham added. “Let’s come up with another word, ‘ceasefire’ is not working.”
Read more: Italy holds third general strike in three months, against war budget and for Palestine
In Italy, the central mobilization followed a successful day of general strike organized by the grassroots union Unione Sindacale di Base (USB). The march welcomed UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese and Freedom Flotilla activists Greta Thunberg and Thiago Ávila. Dockworkers and firefighters affiliated with USB, who have played key roles in earlier protests and faced reprisals for this, also formed notable protest blocs. The response of Italy’s political establishment to growing support for Palestine mirrors that of other European governments: attempting to suppress dissent and insisting that further militarization is the only path forward.
“Today we see what this path has created: a genocide, broadcast live, carried out with the complicity of Western governments; massacres in the Mediterranean; NATO wars; bombs across the world,” said Marta Collot, spokesperson for the left party Potere al Popolo, during the Rome demonstration. “But something has changed too. The September mobilizations, the three general strikes called by USB that brought everything to a halt, and our march today show that they were wrong […] Our demonstration is the message coming from Palestine, from socialist Cuba resisting, from Venezuela. It shows that an alternative path is not only necessary, but that it’s possible.”
“Today there are two Europes,” Marc Botenga emphasized in London. “There is the Europe of the establishment, the Europe of the governments that have funded this genocide, that have supported this genocide, and that are continuing to do so. And then, there’s the other Europe, there’s the Europe that we incarnate here today. That is the Europe of liberation, the Europe that says no to occupation.”
This article by Ana Vračar republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.
‘We are socialist, anti-imperialist, anti-Nato’: Zarah Sultana is up for the fight
Zarah Sultana, MP for Coventry South, addresses protesters during a Stop Trump Coalition protest in Parliament Square, London, on day one of the US President’s second state visit to the UK, September 17, 2025Morning Star political reporter Andrew Murray speaks to ZARAH SULTANA on the mass party of the left holding its inaugural conference this weekend
ZARAH SULTANA is up for the fight. After a bruising few months which would have broken many a political veteran, the young Muslim socialist is still brimming with hope for the new party she has co-founded.
As Your Party heads for its debut conference in Liverpool, she believes that the left is on the brink of something historic, trials and tribulations notwithstanding.
Sultana’s theme, speaking to the Morning Star two days ago, is empowerment — of the members in the new party, and of the working-class communities they seek to serve in society.
Her measure of a successful conference is one where “members feel that it is being shaped by them, not MPs.”
It will also be about “putting a structure in place where they can organise in their communities and win seats in May’s elections.” The basic pitch remains clear: “The government serves the interests of the Elon Musks of this world. It is the working class bearing the burden, as it has for 15 years.
“People want a challenge to the status quo, they need a party that will be fighting for workers’ rights, on climate change, on challenging those who have enabled a genocide, on fighting for civil liberties.”
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“I see no evidence that the government has changed its course. They are still passing PFI deals, still attacking disabled people, changing the rules to make it harder for asylum-seekers. The government is still on a trajectory of attacking the most vulnerable while rolling out a red carpet for Nigel Farage.”
Sultana wants delegates to leave Liverpool with a spring in their step, “feeling empowered, believing that conference was a healthy democratic event, that they have made new connections with people in their communities and regions, and part of a party that is going to win in May and beyond.”
Jeremy Corbyn: it’s time for a party to empower the people
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/jeremy-corbyn-its-time-party-empower-people
Jeremy Corbyn, with Zarah Sultana (not pictured) speaking at a discussion on Your Party, their new political party, at The World Transformed conference, at Niamos Radical Arts Centre in Hulme, Manchester, October 10, 2025With ‘Your Party’ holding its founding conference in Liverpool this weekend, JEREMY CORBYN speaks to Morning Star editor Ben Chacko about its potential, its priorities — and a few of its controversies too
JEREMY CORBYN says the Palestine solidarity movement is a game changer in British politics.
“The Palestine movement is absolutely huge. And like the movement against the Vietnam war of the 1960s, which had a huge impact on political thinking — the rather fossilised structure of both major parties started to disintegrate after that — it means things have to change.”
It’s one of the reasons he says the time is right for a new mass party of the left. “Your Party,” as it is provisionally known, has its founding conference this weekend.
“In my estimation at least two million people in Britain have done something about Palestine over the past 18 months — attend demonstrations, marches, meetings, sent emails, signed petitions.
“A lot of people are coming together on Palestine and at all the Palestine events I’ve been at there’s been a huge interest in the idea of a new party.”
Corbyn, meeting the Morning Star in his Westminster office, isn’t saying one issue would be enough to build a mass movement for change on — but the immense public anger at our Establishment’s complicity in a genocide is a galvanising moment.
One that comes at a time ripe for Labour to be challenged from the left.
“Labour has lost all appeal to the radical sections of the population.” And that, today, means a lot of people.
“Nobody really believes the left are going to be back in power in the Labour Party, because of the structural changes Starmer has brought in,” says Corbyn. Changes everyone knows are intended to prevent anything like Corbyn’s own 2015-20 leadership of the party happening ever again.
“Now is the time for a left party in the tradition of the labour movement. That is where I see myself. I am not leaving the labour movement. I am helping form a political party which will be part of the labour movement.
“We must challenge the ‘triopoly’ of the Tories, Labour and Lib Dems on political, social, environmental and economic thinking. They all believe in austerity, they all believe in market economics, they’re all running away from addressing the environmental crisis and on social justice issues.
“Labour had a ‘loveless landslide’ just over a year ago in the election. A spectacularly low vote for a party moving into government.” Corbyn points out that, while “we didn’t win either election, I fully appreciate that,” the highest Labour votes at general elections this century were both under his leadership, in 2017 and 2019. An important reminder that the idea socialist policies are unpopular at the ballot box is a media-manufactured myth.
Since coming to power Starmer’s government has been “disastrous. Maintaining the two-child benefit cap [finally lifted a day after we spoke], trying to take away the winter fuel allowance, attempting to remove personal independence payments from disabled people.”
On housing, he slams Labour’s refusal to take on the private rental sector or stand up to for-profit builders, who have a stranglehold on construction and resist efforts to include social and council housing in new builds.
He also ties the government’s decision to ramp up military spending to “effective cuts to every other area of public spending.” The government claims it’s increasing spending on the NHS, but he points out that two hospitals near him in north London are cutting spending by £20 million — and all over the country similar cuts are taking place across hospital trusts.
The increased military budget covers “a new generation of nuclear weapons and for the first time since the 1960s airborne nuclear bombs being stationed in Britain. There is no agenda for anything other than war.” And back to the trigger issue, Gaza: “A Labour government has carried on selling arms to Israel while a genocide is going on.”
The appetite for a party that will challenge all this is obvious. But a lot has changed on the British left since Your Party was first announced in July. Most notably, under a new leader, Zack Polanski, the Greens have shifted dramatically left and exploded in size, with many of those joining believed to be from the same 800,000 people who expressed interest in Your Party. Is another left party needed in that context, and isn’t the left becoming a crowded field?
“I want to be part of a socialist party — one fundamentally about social and economic transformation. I agree with a lot of what the Greens say, especially on environmental issues, and will work with them. Just last night I was working with the Greens on an amendment to the English Devolution Bill.
“But this is at root about public ownership and workers’ control.
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Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/jeremy-corbyn-its-time-party-empower-people
Amnesty warns Gaza genocide ‘not over’ as first phase of ceasefire nears completion
Palestinians inspect the damage to a house targeted by an Israeli strike in Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, November 22, 2025THE Gaza genocide is “not over” despite the declared ceasefire, rights group Amnesty International warned today, accusing Israel of launching fresh attacks and tightening restrictions on vital aid.
Israel has violated the ceasefire agreement more than 500 times in seven weeks.
Since the recent truce began, at least 345 Palestinians have been killed, with the total officially confirmed dead exceeding 69,000. However, independent research suggests that the real death toll could be in the region of 100,000 or more.
The rights organisation’s statement came as Israeli forces carried out air strikes in southern and central Gaza, including in areas beyond the yellow line where they are required to remain withdrawn.
Amnesty secretary-general Agnes Callamard said there was “no indication” that Israel was “taking meaningful steps to reverse the impact of its crimes,” adding: “Israeli authorities are continuing their ruthless policies, restricting access to vital humanitarian aid and essential services, and deliberately imposing conditions calculated to physically destroy Palestinians in Gaza.
“The world must not be fooled. Israel’s genocide is not over.”
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Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/amnesty-warns-gaza-genocide-not-over-first-phase-ceasefire-nears-completion