The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) expresses its steadfast solidarity to the people of Palestine and their just struggle for land, food, and peace. The Al-Aqsa Flood of October 7, 2023 was a historic moment not only for Palestinian liberation, but for all national liberation movements worldwide as it exposes the frailty of colonial powers even fully supported by the full weight of US imperialism against the unbeatable strength of mass uprisings. In return, Israel has ramped up its genocidal campaign, intensifying its decades-long history of displacement, famine, and death upon the people of Palestine.

The Zionist regime — bolstered by billions of dollars in military aid and arms sales particularly from the United States of America, has escalated its genocidal project resulting in the confirmed deaths of over 41,000 Palestinians through direct airstrikes and gunfire, and potentially over 335,000 more through forced starvation, disease, and environmental destruction. Palestine then becomes a springboard for US and Israel to lay claim to the region and has then launched ground invasions and bombardments in the neighboring Axis of Resistance — Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Iran, all bankrolled by American taxpayer money.

On our shores, the Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administration has direct culpability for the crimes in Gaza, and the peasant struggle plays a crucial role in exposing and weakening the imperialist death grip in the region. Marcos Jr. does not only command fascist attacks locally, but also funds the collective punishment brought upon by Israel, as The Philippines remains to be the second largest importer of arms from the Zionist entity. As peasants resist land grabbing and state-sponsored violence aimed at protecting business and foreign interests, they shed light on the deep ties between the Philippine government and global arms trade. Since the US lapdog Marcos Jr. stepped into office in 2022, a vast majority of extrajudicial killings — about 69% of the over 100 cases are from the peasantry. The militarization of the countryside, justified under counterinsurgency campaigns, serves not only to suppress farmers’ assertion of their democratic rights and demands but also to maintain the region as a lucrative market for arms sales by imperialist powers. Therefore by resisting these violent encroachments, the Filipino peasantry debilitates imperialist hold in the region, contributing to the dismantling of the network of arms trade and corporate greed that fuels the US-imperialist agenda in its semi-colonies. This year alone, Marcos Jr. has approved a $35-billion budget to modernize the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), while The Philippines has received a whopping $500 million military aid out of the $2.5 billion Foreign Military Financing (FMF) from the US to empower its stakes in the Indo-Pacific region. KMP echoes the call to cease all Philippine arms procurement from the US and Israel.

The Filipino peasantry are no strangers to the struggles of the Palestinian people. Like in the Philippines, the majority of Palestine’s population consists of peasants: in 2012, 13.4% were formally employed in agriculture and 90% informally. Even with this cruel reality regarding land and food, Israel imposes stringent food blockades amidst control of 85% of food and water supply with its all-out land grabbing and neoliberalization of agriculture. Some of these restrictive policies include preventing Palestinians from digging up water wells, limiting irrigation, shutting down all agricultural banks, and stifling Palestinian access to export markets and tightly regulating their agricultural exports to Israel, while allowing Israeli farm products unrestricted access to Palestinian territories. The escalation of the genocide in Gaza resulted to a lack of access to farmlands, where people turn to foraging for their food. Similarly, the landless farmers of San Jose Del Monte (SJDM), Bulacan who experience harsh militarization preventing them from planting food, sometimes forage in order to eat and sell produce. The fascist onslaught in Palestine and in the Philippines doubly punishes its victims by labeling them as “terrorists”, even when their fight is legitimate and their demands unmet in the face of soaring economic and political crises.

As we observe Peasant Month this October, we also honor the brave fighters and martyrs of the Al-Aqsa Flood — embodying the correctness of armed struggle to resist and confront colonization and imperialism towards national liberation. The self-same struggle for land in Gaza and in the Philippines, and all colonies and semi-colonies remain to be strongholds of the global fight against imperialism for a truly just and lasting peace.

Long live Palestine! Down with Zionism! Down with Imperialism!