THIS is not the beginning of the end — it isn’t even the end of the beginning.

Trump’s “peace in our time” plan has all the worth of Chamberlain’s missive from Hitler. It provides a truce to the unremitting slaughter — although the trauma continues as the people of Gaza return to find the horror of yet more bodies, many having been executed in cold blood, underneath the rubble.

There is no mention of a second state, there is no mention of a free, independent Palestine even as some distant goal to be worked towards.

No recognition of its possibility by the States, let alone by Israel which remains as truculent as ever repeating endlessly there will never be a Palestine.

No two-state solution, no mention of the 1967 borders.

Whilst the Western media “trumpet” to his glory, “the Peace Prize will surely be his next time” — the reality is that Israel is still at war. It has no intention of dismantling its apartheid regime, Palestine is still under its military occupation and domination.

Saturday’s march of half a million in London was a tremendous statement of solidarity, the 32nd such march. Although US pressure has always been the necessary ingredient to get Israel to listen at all, Trump’s comment to Israel that you can’t fight the world in a backhanded way acknowledges that Israel has lost the world.

The global solidarity movement, growing in country after country — marches, flotillas, strikes, recognition, boycotts — the tide of support for Palestine has been growing and growing.

But in the aftermath of the truce — a ceasefire waiting to be broken as all previous ones have been by Israel — it is right to welcome the respite it will bring.

Aid, desperately needed food, will flow in; there will be talk of reconstruction. But we should not forget that it is Palestinian resistance and resilience that has brought this about. They have died, suffered, starved and had no opportunity to grieve.

But there is no talk by the West of justice or what a real solution might look like. Only the palliatives in the plan.

The challenge to the solidarity movements in this country and across the world will be to win the hearts and minds of people, pressure its politicians and force Western powers to accept that this is not enough, not nearly enough if there is to be a lasting peace.

Israel has crossed so many red lines, committed so many crimes under international law, it has so many years of oppressive history to account for that a temporary cessation of the bombings cannot be viewed as anything more than a tiny step on what is a very long road to unwind all the years of injustice.

As the Western powers gather in Egypt to congratulate themselves, if you listened to the press you would “think it is all over.” Therefore now is an appropriate time to take stock and set out the charge sheet against Israel.

First of all, the crimes have still been committed, they have been done and cannot be undone. The slaughter of women and children, the deliberate starvation and famine, the ethnic cleansing and genocide did all happen. Those responsible, not just in Israel but in the US and Britain as well, need to be held accountable. The UN and International Court of Justice must be made to continue their work.

Secondly, Israel has built and established an apartheid colonial regime — this needs to be dismantled, literally brick by brick. There are the ever-expanding settlements, with approaching a million illegal settlers, protected and buttressed by the wall. All illegally built on stolen land made possible by the ethnic cleansing of the indigenous Palestinian population. Settlements linked by the settler only road system. The wall, settlements and settlers must go.

Underpinning this settler colonisation of Palestine is the military occupation. The Israeli armed forces have military control of all the territory from the river to the sea. Through physical occupation, the hundreds of checkpoints, military incursions and the ever-present oppressive threat of the armed IDF presence everywhere. The occupation must end, no Israeli troops on Palestinian land.

It is a dystopian prison with constant surveillance digitally and by drones and the Israeli security services. For Palestinians there is no freedom of movement.

Israel controls its airspace and all its land borders, blocking aid at the border crossings, and at sea stopping fishing and the flotillas. It can open and close them all at will, Palestinians can only pass through at the grace and favour of Israel.

Palestine cannot trade, import or export freely, it has no air or rail links with the outside world.

Israel has stolen Palestine’s land, destroyed its olive trees; stolen its waters and control of its aquifers, is — along with Egypt, after its gas in the Mediterranean Sea and the oil under the West Bank — not forgetting the minerals in the Dead Sea. Palestine must get back its land and resources.

All civilian life has been systematically destroyed — the health and education systems, civic and religious buildings, markets, agricultural land and farms. Its utilities are in ruins.

East Jerusalem — historically Palestine’s economic and religious heart — has been stolen through its annexation in 1968. Its population are classed as residents, not citizens, paying taxes, but not allowed to vote in Israeli national elections, whilst blocked from representation within the Palestinian Authority.

Palestinians live under Israel’s military law not their own laws; they are not free to marry, vote, buy land, build houses or move without the Israeli state’s approval or risk its intervention.

Israel was built on a legal framework that guarantees the protected legal status and superiority of Jews. In every respect Palestinians under occupation are treated unequally, they do not have the same rights as Israeli Jews, not least the settlers. It is an apartheid regime. It is the same for the 1.5 million Palestinians living in Israel, notionally citizens or “residents” but with lesser rights, different laws, education system and rules — especially about preventing land ownership.

This leaves aside the deaths, murders, settler violence, false imprisonment — often without charge — of the “hostages” Israel has seized and the hundreds of child prisoners.

Strangely enough, hardly any of these fundamental issues are mentioned in the plan — because Israel has no intention of changing any of this. It is determined to keep Palestinians under its “iron heel.” The colonial framework of Trump and Blair’s plan is designed to do just that — true justice and freedom is not on the agenda.

Therefore, the task for the solidarity movement is clear, but very challenging.

It is to transform the huge, global support there is into a sustainable movement capable of maintaining pressure on Western governments. The vote at the Labour Party conference to call out the genocide that was taking place shows that there is scope to win support for meaningful action in perhaps unlikely places given Starmer’s support for Israel’s zionist aims.

The Palestinian strategy of internal resistance coupled with global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions pressure remains the only way forward, but we need to go to places we’ve not been before.

Sanctions and an end to the arms trade remain essential — the world should not replenish Israel’s arms stocks and feed its military trade, on which its economy relies. Trade with Israel should be sanctioned, not privileged.

Governments need to be forced take meaningful action. Divestment needs to spread and become the ethical, institutional norm — for banks, churches, pension funds and all public bodies.

Boycott in all its forms — consumer, cultural, sporting — should be everyone’s default position.

There might be a pause in marching, but there is much work to be done. The priority will be to reach out and organise those not involved and committed, to harness those who are into renewed activity.

The aim is the decolonisation of Palestine, supporting Palestinians in this fight to dismantle and bring down the regime that has been oppressing them for so long, then to achieve this the need for a united, strong, solidarity movement will be greater than ever.

The true freedom of Palestine will only come when they have back their land, self-determination and the right and dignity to be treated on the basis of equality.

Whatever the solution proposed, whatever emerges from Sharm El Sheikh it must pass the same test — are Palestinians treated on an equal footing with Israelis in all aspects of their lives? Is Palestine going to be a genuinely free entity, controlling its own borders and security?

This will not be true so long as Israel, backed by the US, remains its colonial overseer. Total decolonisation, brick by brick, is the only true solution that will be equality for all.

Hugh Lanning is co-founder of Labour and Palestine. On Saturday October 18, he will chair a special fringe event at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature, Gaza – Can we Stop the Horror? with speakers including environmentalist and writer Jonathon Porritt, Stop the War convener Lindsey German and Iranian scholar Yassamine Mather, taking place at Friends Meeting House, Warwick Place, Cheltenham GL52 2NP from 2.30-4.30pm. Tickets £7.50 on the door, £5 concessions, or here. All profits to Palestinian charities.