the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Sep 1, 2025
This article is translated from the August 29, issue #2978 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the paper of the revolutionary workers group of that name active in France.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government implemented its “Chariots of Gideon II” plan on August 21, under pressure from ultranationalist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Defense Minister Bezalel Smotrich. This plan is a new step in Israel’s genocidal policy.
Five army divisions and 60,000 additional reservists are being mobilized to impose a total occupation of Gaza City. In the name of total security control, Israel is imposing a forced evacuation to what it cynically calls the “humanitarian zone” of Al-Mawasi, an overcrowded southern coastal ghetto transformed into a death trap.
This step comes on top of nearly two years of a war of extermination that has already killed at least 63,000 Palestinians, 83% of them civilians, and a famine that continues worsening. Nothing escapes the carnage caused by Israeli bombs. Schools, refugee camps, and hospitals have been targeted again and again. On August 25, two Israeli strikes on Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, the main medical center in the south, killed at least 20 people, including emergency responders who came to evacuate the wounded and five journalists.
Netanyahu shows he has nothing to fear from any hypocritical pleas and feigned protests by Western leaders, such as the belated commitment by French President Emmanuel Macron and other leaders to recognize a Palestinian state. Israel continues to receive the major imperialist powers’ de facto support.
But this headlong military rush may eventually encounter resistance from the Israeli population itself. After 22 months of fighting, a crisis shakes the army. According to estimates, between 50 and 60% of reservists refuse to report, or more than 100,000 people out of the approximately 295,000 mobilized since 2023. The prolonged periods of mobilization—300 days and sometimes even 420—destroy family lives. Three-quarters of reservists suffer from exhaustion, trauma, or psychological disorders. “Our lives are on hold for an impossible victory,” a young soldier from Rishon LeZion testified. Moral objections, denunciations of ethnic cleansing, and complete loss of confidence in Netanyahu: demoralization is massive and is being expressed. Even officers oppose operations deemed suicidal or likely to lead to the execution of hostages. Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir warned that the occupation would turn into a human and economic “black hole.”
The “Gideon Plan” embodies the deadly impasse of permanent war. For Palestinians, it exacerbates genocide and famine. For Israelis, it reveals the weariness and despair of a youth forced to drag out an endless war. Hope lies in the courage of the Palestinian people who refuse to give in, and in that minority within the Israeli population who refuse to be the instrument of a policy to which they too are subjected.