TEHRAN - On the first anniversary of the al-Aqsa Storm Operation on October 7, 2023, the Palestinian resistance factions in Gaza have published a defiant joint statement vowing to continue the battle against the Israeli occupation.

The statement touches on the importance of the operation to shed light on the Palestinian cause, which many experts say had been ignored in global affairs.

This is despite the decades-long aggression, settlement expansion, and violation of international law across the occupied Palestinian territories.

That aggression has substantially increased over the past year, which the statement by the Palestinian resistance brands as a "Nazi-Zionist Occupation".

The statement read as follows: 

"The Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip held an important national meeting on the first anniversary of the Battle of the Flood of Al-Aqsa and the Holy Crossing on the glorious 7 of October, and in light of the war of genocide waged by the Nazi Zionist occupation against our Palestinian and Lebanese people and the peoples of our Arab and Islamic World.

The Zionist occupation continues to practice in its aggression against the Palestinian people the most heinous forms of killing, starvation, displacement, and systematic destruction of all aspects of life in Gaza. It continues settlement, continuous incursions, field assassinations, and settler rampages in the occupied West Bank. It continues to Judaize al-Quds (Jerusalem) and end the Palestinian presence in our eternal capital. It also changes the religious and geographical reality of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque through incursions, temporal and spatial control, and calls by the occupation leaders to establish a Jewish synagogue in it. It also practices racial discrimination against our people inside occupied Palestine, and torture, and fascist behavior against our free prisoners in the occupation prisons.

In light of this scene, we in the Palestinian factions emphasize the following:

1. We salute our heroic Palestinian people and their proud and lofty resistance, who, through their steadfastness and perseverance, have thwarted the occupation’s plans and liquidation projects that target the Palestinian identity and existence. We also salute the souls of our righteous martyrs and free prisoners, and we wish a speedy recovery to our valiant wounded.

2. The blessed Battle of Al-Aqsa Flood on the glorious 7th of October brought about a strategic shift in the conflict with the Zionist occupation and revealed its truth to the entire world. It also came in the natural context of responding to the crimes of the criminal occupation against our Palestinian people and confronting the projects and plans of the Zionist occupation and its supporters. The resistance continues as a legitimate right to achieve freedom and establish a free Palestinian state with al-Quds (Jerusalem) as its capital. We also reassure our people that the resistance, with all its wings, is in good condition and is in high and continuous coordination on all fronts and all axes of combat.

3. The Palestinian people are the only ones who have the right to self-determination for the day after the war, and this issue is discussed only at the Palestinian table, and any ideas and attempts to create an alternative administration outside the national consensus and decision of the Palestinian people will be treated as if they were the Zionist occupation, and we highly value and appreciate the position of our people’s national and living components that reject the occupation’s projects and plans.

4. We affirm that there will be no agreement or deal unless our people’s demands are met to stop the aggression, withdraw completely from the Gaza Strip, open the crossings, break the siege, rebuild, and achieve a serious prisoner exchange deal.

5. We call on our people, our nation, and our resistance in the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the occupied interior, and in all arenas and fronts, to escalate comprehensive resistance, especially armed resistance, and to engage more in the blessed Battle of the Flood of Al-Aqsa to stop the war of genocide, protect Al-Aqsa Mosque from temporal and spatial religious control, stop the Judaization of al-Quds (Jerusalem), curb the settlement barbarism, end racial discrimination against our people in the occupied interior, and stop the inhumane treatment of our free prisoners.

6. We call upon the peoples of our Arab and Islamic World, scholars, clerics, Arab tribes, unions, popular movements, parties and factions everywhere to take immediate and urgent action in all squares, cities and capitals and target the interests of the occupation and its supporters in revenge for the Palestinian and Lebanese blood, and to pressure to stop the war of genocide and to hold the Zionist occupation accountable for its crimes.

7. We call for holding a comprehensive national dialogue to complete the outcomes of the Moscow and Beijing meetings to achieve the aspirations of our people to liberate their land and establish the Palestinian state with al-Quds (Jerusalem) as its capital.

8. We salute the heroes of our proud resistance in the cities and camps of the West Bank that are revolting against the Zionist aggression, tyranny and terrorism. We bless their heroic operations and call on them to continue escalating the resistance and making the occupation and its settler gangs pay the price for their crimes and aggression against our people. We also salute the fronts supporting our people who have registered their names on the bright side of history.

Mercy for the martyrs of our people and the Islamic World, speedy recovery for the wounded, freedom for the prisoners, and victory for our nation, people, and resistance."