The Israeli state has murdered at least 500 people at the al Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza as it unleashes a Second Nakba on Palestinians.

That’s more than the death toll at Deir Yassin—the massacre that came to symbolise the Nakba of 1948 when Zionist forces ethnically cleansed over 800,000 Palestinians. 

The Palestinian health ministry released the death toll on Tuesday night—and it’s likely to rise. Videos and pictures shared on social media show the al-Ahli hospital in flames. Al Jazeera correspondent Wael Al Dahdouh, who was at the scene following the air strike, said, “We’re witnessed horrifying images of children, young people, old men and women, body parts and mutilated bodies. The bombing took place in the centre of the hospital, not on the outskirts.”

This should be a watershed moment. Israel can no longer hide from the truth in the eyes of the world with lies that it’s targeting “terrorists”. 

Israel bombed a hospital filled with the sick, the dying, the young and the old. It wanted to punish the Palestinians for daring to fight back against settler colonialism and humiliate the Israeli war machine. 

How much longer will the Labour Party line up behind Israel’s murderous war crimes—and the left fail to speak out for fear of being thrown out of this pro-Zionist party? How can the unions now continue to come out with mealy-mouthed statements condemning violence on both sides? 

There cannot be a repeat of last weekend’s woeful showing from the labour movement on the Palestine solidarity demonstration. 

Unions should mobilise for the demonstrations on Saturday with banners held high. Every trade unionist in their workplace should argue for their colleagues to join demonstrations. Health workers should show their rage at the hospital massacre. 

Every Labour MP and member who once professed their support for Palestine but failed to speak Now is not the time to cower in the corner. 

Now it’s all the more urgent to have walkouts, protests and mobilisations at universities and workplaces against the Israeli terror. It was magnificent to see 1,000 Glasgow students march and block roads in solidarity with Palestine on Tuesday—we need more like it and on a bigger scale. 

The Tories and other Western powers funded and supported this barbarity. They have supported Israel’s right to “defend itself”—in reality, the right to defend its brutal colonial regime—at every turn. 

We must go all out for the demonstration on Saturday—and shake the Israeli warmongers and their Western backers to the core. 

Join the emergency march for Palestine, this Saturday 21st October, meeting at Marble Arch, London, 12pm