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Why Berliners should join tomorrow’s Nakba Day Demo

The current level of repression makes it even more important that we show our strength


17/05/2024

Tomorrow (Saturday, 18th May) is the Nakba commemoration demonstration in Berlin. In 2022, this demonstration was banned. In 2023, it was banned again. Given the current level of repression, you’d assume that we have no chance of demonstrating this year.

Repression

German police have never been friends of Palestine activists, but in the last 7 months, we have experienced more repression than ever before. At the beginning of October, all demonstrations were banned. Wearing “symbols of Palestine” was also banned in schools.

When demonstrators commemorating the racist murders in Hanau drew links with Palestine, they were subjected to severe police violence. More recently, the police brutally cleared the camps for Gaza outside the Bundestag and at FU.

The Berlin Senate is trying to introduce a law allowing Universities to ex-matriculate students who take part in demonstrations. This law is clearly aimed at Palestine solidarity. Similarly, the German mainstream press has consistently attacked Palestinians and their supporters.

Germany is also introducing a new nationality law which will make it more difficult for people who the State believes to be antisemitic to receive citizenship. The way in which accusations of antisemitism are currently used to attack pro-Palestine activists and film makers shows that this law is clearly not aimed at the white right wing extremists who carry out 93% of antisemitic acts in Germany.

Muslims are being accused of importing antisemitism to a country which supposedly has always been welcoming to Jews, apart from that embarrassing blip in the 1930s and 40s. Such victim blaming has the effect of both letting the real Nazis off the hook and further demonising Palestinians alongside others from migrant families.

All this is happening in a country where the AfD – a party which is riddled with antisemites and actual Nazis – is currently the second most popular party. Leading AfD members took part in a conference last year which seriously discussed deporting millions of migrants and people with the “wrong” political opinions. Just imagine what an authoritarian AfD would do with these new laws.

In the face of such repression, a common sense response is to keep your head down, not to make a fuss, and to hope that the attacks will go away. Experience tells us that this strategy is illusory. If we do not resist the repression now, the bully boys will feel empowered and come back for more.

Resistance

Notwithstanding all the repression, I’m not so sure that tomorrow’s demo will be banned. Because every instance of police repression has met with resistance on our side. And we are winning.

What was the response to the initial bans in October? Hundreds of young people marched down Sonnenallee wearing kuffiyahs. Within a couple of weeks, the demo ban was lifted, and we were marching through the streets of Berlin.

When police attacked the camps for Gaza, further camps sprung up – both in German universities, and worldwide. When they broke up the camp at FU, over 1,000 educators signed a letter of complaint, causing the FU authorities to stop attacking students.

Every action of repression is met with a more than equal opposite reaction of resistance. The demonstrations are no longer just about the genocide in Gaza. They are about the right to protest, freedom of speech, and opposing increasingly heavy-handed policing.

What will happen tomorrow… ?

At tomorrow’s demonstration, there are two possibilities. The police may once more ban the demo at the last minute. In which case, we need as many people as possible at Oranienplatz at 2pm to defy the ban. We cannot let the Berliner police determine where we can and cannot meet. In particular, Palestinians must have a place to mourn their dead and dispossessed.

Those of us with relatively secure residency status have a special duty to protect our Palestinian brothers and sisters. For months, people with precarious Aufenthalt have been demonstrating, even though they know that being arrested could have serious implications for their right to stay in Germany. We must demonstrate en masse and protect each other.

The other possibility is that we are allowed to march. We must turn this into a show of strength. Tomorrow’s demonstration is not just against Israel’s genocide and German complicity. It is against the criminalisation of protest and for everyone who has been unjustly arrested or beaten. The more people turn up tomorrow, the better we can support them.

Our strength lies in our depth and our diversity. Come to tomorrow’s demonstration, but don’t come on your own. Bring your friends, your family, your neighbours, and the person sitting opposite you on the U-Bahn.

… and afterwards?

Worldwide protests, from US campuses to the streets of Jordan, show that we have a worldwide movement which is fighting not just for Palestinian rights but for a better world. Our leaders have lost all credibility, and it is time to build something different, something better. Recent developments show that, despite all limitations, it is also possible to build such a movement in Germany.

On Wednesday morning, the 76th anniversary of the Nakba, Palestine activists gave out over 1,000 leaflets at the Amazon Web Service summit in Berlin. The leaflets demanded that Amazon drop Project Nimbus, a 1.2 billion dollar contract with the Israeli government and military. This is one of many local initiatives aimed at bringing Palestine into the mainstream by targeting, for example, climate activists and trade unionists. Although White Germans have been reluctant to publicly stand up for Gaza, the mood is changing.

At a meeting organised by the Palestine Campaign on Wednesday, someone in the public brought up the idea of setting up neighbourhood activist groups for Palestine. This had a massive resonance, with 70 people signing that night. If you are interested in setting up something in your Kiez, please contact us at team@theleftberlin.com and we can put you in touch with local activists who want to do something similar.

Tomorrow is the next step in liberating Palestine and building a different type of society worldwide. Come along, we have nothing to lose but our chains.

Berlin Nakba Day Demo. Oranienplatz, 2pm, followed by discussion, food and networking. Similar events are being organised in other cities.

At least he’s honest: Berlin’s mayor rejects democracy

A big majority of Berliners voted to socialize big corporate landlords. Kai Wegner’s response: Nein


16/05/2024

It’s rare that the mayor of our fine city makes the international news. When he does, it’s usually an embarrassment, like when he accused an Israeli filmmaker of antisemitism, right before he embraced Elon Musk who repeatedly makes headlines with accusations of antisemitism. Kai Wegner would be well-qualified to lead a right-wing Stammtisch in some small town, but he seems out of place representing our cosmopolitan city.

Yet Wegner, the master of empty smiles and racist clichés, has suddenly experienced a burst of honesty when he declared: »As long as I’m mayor, big housing companies will not be expropriated in this city.« This is new.

It’s been almost three years since a huge majority of Berliners voted to socialize big corporate landlords. This was incredibly popular: 1,035,950 voted for Enteignung – the number would have been even higher if over 20 percent of Berliners were not excluded from voting. Wegner is far less popular – his CDU got just 428,228 votes, concentrated in the suburbs.

In a democracy, politicians would implement the voters’ decision. Yet Berlin’s politicians didn’t feel like it. Instead, they carried out a years-long, completely unconvincing theater: Both Wegner and his social democratic deputy Franziska Giffey assured us they would turn the people’s will into law – they just needed more time!

First, they created an »expert commission« to investigate whether Germany’s Basic Law allows expropriations. (You can check that yourself in a few seconds, with no expertise required.) Then, they said an »expropriation framework law« was required as a precursor to an »expropriation law«. This was not true – and they have since admitted they weren’t working on the framework law either. Endless delaying tactics.

So Wegner deserves some praise for ending this charade. He’s had the courage to say indirectly: Fuck the will of the Berliners.

Meanwhile, Berlin’s landlords continue to run amok. In just the last year, rents in the city shot up by almost 19 percent. Many real estate companies refuse to do even the most basic maintenance, leading to dystopian scenes in housing projects. As »nd« reported, at the Weiße Siedlung in Neukölln, there weren’t even reairs after a fire!

Wegner’s government has instead been buying back apartments at inflated prices. They just gave €700 million to Vonovia for 4,500 units. These are often units that the city privatized two decades ago at fire sale prices. Investors let the properties rot – and are now selling them back for several times more than they paid.

The dealings between Berlin’s politicians and reality speculators are so legendary that it has a long-established name: Berliner Filz. I often wonder if Wegner and his predecessors are sincere in their racist fear-mongering about »clan criminality« – for them, this is probably just a convenient distraction from the mismanagement of the public coffers.

When there is money to be made, Berlin’s rulers toss democracy to the wayside. This was already the case with the referendum on the development of Tempelhofer Feld.

What worries me is that people can feel like »democracy« gives them nothing but a housing crisis and so they turn to the »alternative« presented by the Far Right. The irony, of course, is that the AfD has close ties to billionaire speculators, and wants to make things even worse for renters.

Real democracy would mean putting Berlin’s housing under public control. Real democracy is when masses of people go onto the streets in defense of their interests, like at the upcoming demonstration against »rent insanity« on June 1.

The English-speaking housing campaign Right to the City are not putting their heads down. They told me they’ve had a lot of successes recently contesting rent increases. Their advice: »Organize! Know your rights! Sue your landlord«. The campaign to expropriate big landlords is currently organizing a signature campaign to get an expropriation law passed directly.

Wegner, by the way, is still in favor of expropriations in order to build an inner-city freeway through Friedrichshain. As if he only rejects expropriations if the goal is affordable rents.

This article is a mirror of Nathaniel’s Red Flag column for Neues Deutschland. Reproduced with permission

Constitutional rights, the Nazis and the state

The experience from fighting the fascist menace in Greece


15/05/2024

On April 24, department A1 of the Greek Supreme Court announced that the party Spartiates (Spartans) was removed from the list of those allowed to participate in the coming European elections. The essence of the judgment of the Supreme Court is that “It has been proved that Ilias Kasidiaris, the actual leader of ‘Spartiates’, which is standing in for the banned Golden Dawn, never remotely disapproved or rejected hate speech, violent and racist action, within the criminal apparatus of theparty, of which he was a leading member”. [Decision Number: 1/2024, SUPREME COURT OF JUSTICE, A1′ CIVIL DIVISION]

Not surprisingly, the Supreme Court has just now discovered that Spartiates are the showcase of convicted and imprisoned former Golden Dawn commander Kasidiaris and a whitewash of the criminal Nazi organization. Everyone knew this a year ago, when Spartiates participated for the first time in parliamentary elections with court approval. There is now a pending trial against all eleven Spartiates MPs and Kasidiaris for deceiving the electorate about who the real leader of Spartans is.

The exclusion from the European elections took place after an appeal by Social Democratic PASOK, Syriza’s left split Nea Aristera (NEAR) and the governing right-wing New Democracy. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis claims primacy in anti-fascism: “We fight far-right fascism in action, not in words […]” he declared. Is this good news for anti-fascists? The answer is no. It is sheer audacity that Nev democracy claims to deliver lessons in confronting fascism. We need to remember the way we fought against the Nazi gang Golden Dawn and the battles that led to its conviction as a criminal organisation.

A flawed argument

The main argument is not the ongoing demagogic public discourse about which party will “inherit” the votes of the fascist Spartiates. In this competition, New Democracy is competing with three ultra nationalist, racist, homophobic formations: “Hellenic Solution”, “Nike” (the party of the Orthodox Church) and the newly formed “Patriots”. In fact, the judicial exclusion of far-right parties for being “dangerous for the constitution” gave the opportunity to other, less extremist, far-right formations to purify themselves through the “good and bad far-right” division.

The far-right rhetoric of the members and MPs of Nike, Hellenic Solution and sometimes even of the ruling party, is equally dangerous for democracy. But these parties are trying to normalise their discourse, by counterposing a “bad and criminal” far-right, which must be removed, with a good far right, which not only is to be tolerated, but also govern the country…

The crucial question, though, is whether a constitutional ban is an efficient method for halting the advance of the far right. Let’s examine some parts of the long verdict of the Supreme Court:

The entire reasoning of the court is based on the following notion:

“a political party that incites violence and promotes political views that do not respect democracy, or that aims to dismantle it and violate the rights recognized by it, does not enjoy protection against legislative regulations that are presented as necessary and desirable in order to protect democracy itself”.

Back in the 1970’s when a new Greek constitution was drafted following the fall of the military junta:

“such a provision was proposed but withdrawn, after the objection of the parties of the opposition, as it was in line with the then prevailing socio-political conditions, in which Greece was emerging from the seven-year dictatorship and there was justified distrust of the real purpose of the constitutional legislator for the first post-dictatorial operation of Greek democracy. Those circumstances then necessitated the refusal of the prohibition of parties.” 

[Decision Number: 1/2024, SUPREME COURT OF JUSTICE, A1′ CIVIL DIVISION]

The court judges are arguing today that the circumstances have changed and allow for a “proper and justified” prohibition, because trust in the operation of democracy in the country has been finally restored (!).

There is nothing to celebrate in this decision. The very same people (the courts) who correctly today judge Spartiates a threat for democracy, might less or more willingly apply the same measures to the left-wing parties, if the political situation and the balance of forces allow them to do so.

The Greek constitution of 1975 tried to make up for the lack of democratic rights inherited by the Civil war (1945-49) and the demise of the Left. Even before the military regime of 1967-74, legislation not only banned all left-wing parties as a threat to democracy, but also foresaw hard punishments for any sympathizer of communist ideas. Citizens were denied a job in public services if they had family bonds with Communists, people were exiled to isolated islands in the middle of the Aegean Sea as a punishment for any expression of discontent with the regime and in order to get a job, one had to achieve the notorious “certificate of political beliefs”. This is how the ban “for the sake of democracy” functioned then. Thanks to working class resistance, it turned out to be completely unsuccessful in the long term in smashing left wing ideas.

Is it therefore a correct for the anti-fascist movement to demand that neo-Nazis be outlawed? The contradiction lies in the fact that for the majority of people who hate neo-Nazis and are alarmed by their re-emergence, a ban looks like an immediate, legitimate, practical solution, especially bearing in mind that so far Golden Dawn was convicted but punished softly by the courts and state apparatuses continue to cover Nazi members. On the other hand, the majority of the people in the Left and the social movements are understandably opposed to any ban, considering bans a possible weapon in the hands of the bourgeois state, to be used against the militants and not the fascists.

The experience so far from fighting Golden Dawn

Back in 2010-2012, Greece experienced the rise of Golden Dawn from a gang of fascist thugs to a political party, demanding and achieving successes in a new way compared to the past: It benefited from the collapse of the mainstream rightwing parties because of their role in introducing austerity measures and memoranda and picked up hundreds of thousands of votes, which allowed them to gain parliamentary representation and financial resources.

Did Golden Dawn transform itself into another “legitimate political party”, as it claimed at that time? The answer to this question was and remains a big No. Golden Dawn has always been a Nazi gang. Its decision to take the form of a party was a conscious strategy to exploit any freedom in order to use violence against its enemies (immigrants, militants, etc.) through its Street Battalions which demanded control in the neighborhoods.

In the Greek anti-fascist movement, we did not focus on the demand for banning GD, even at the times when the question emerged in the mainstream political discourse. It was also important to recognize the political context: when Golden Dawn was a fringe group and the bourgeois political system could claim clear differentiation from its political opinion, then a demand to outlaw it might have been useful. But in 2012, after Golden Dawn hat gained 7% and was on the rise, and the government was actually implementing the far-right agenda, the demand for a legal ban in response to the neo-Nazi threat was inappropriate and disorienting. It is true that for decades the ruling class and the State had not put any real barriers to the activity of this criminal gang. This is a disgrace for the Greek bourgeoisie, which only acted after the antifascist movement exposed Golden Dawn’s Nazi character.

The fight against Golden Dawn was organized mostly the other way round: A strong mass movement, comprising of several organizations and initiatives, with bonds with the trade unions, the universities and the left parties emerged in the country and opposed all activities of the fascists, whether it was opening a new headquarters, rallying against immigrants, or organizing pogroms. Even if it was not always successful in individual campaigns, the movement exposed the racist practices of GD to its newly attracted audience and to the entire society. These were the priorities and not the demand to the government and the state to legally ban GD. This hard work was carried out at a time (2012-13) when GD was considered by a section of the governing party to be a possible governmental partner in order to prevent a left-wing government.

In this way, following the assassination of militant rap singer Pavlos Fyssas in September 2013, the movement pressed the government to file a case against them. The group of lawyers for the civil prosecution against Golden Dawn undertook the task to link the ideological profile of GD with the murderous attacks on Pavlos Fyssas, the Egyptian fishermen and PAME trade-unionists. This was a crucial battle, which ended up in victory. Golden Dawn was convicted neither for its ideas, nor for its leader’s declarations, although we still remember that at the timeNikolaos Michaloliakos introduced Golden Dawn as the “seed of the defeated army of 1945”. Golden Dawn was convicted for proven crimes executed by its members following orders stemming from its leadership and spread through the party apparatus. There is a huge difference between this sentence and the “threat to democracy” expressed today by the Supreme Court.

Golden Dawn leader is out of jail

On May 2, Golden Dawn “führer” Nikolaos Michaloliakos was released from jail, following a court decision which granted him parole, although an appeal trial is still going on, demanding that all GD leaders’ imprisonments be increased. This development was outrageous and a blow to any belief that the state and the courts may be allies in anti-fascist struggle.

“The release of Nikos Michaloliakos from prison is a huge provocation against the victims of the Nazi criminal Golden Dawn and their families, the antifascist movement and democratic public opinion”, reads a statement by the civil prosecution group against Golden Dawn comprised by Thanasis Kampagiannis, Kostas Papadakis and Kostas Skarmeas, the lawyers representing the Egyptian fishermen in the GD trial.

Michaloliakos was released only because the most favorable regulations and the most beneficial provisions were applied to his person, his advanced age, his health condition and his “positive behavior”! He was released officially due to the provision that he has served slightly more than one third of his sentence (which happened in the best possible conditions, as he spent the last two years in a rehabilitation center near Athens). His release could be made feasible only under the condition of repentance and remorse, but Michaloliakos not only did not show “repentance and remorse” but continued to guide criminal Golden Dawn which, despite its loss of members and power, has never stopped organizing attacks, trying to maintain local caucuses, while former cadres of Golden Dawn have led racist and fascist attacks all over the country.

The end of the civil prosecution group statement concludes and summarizes the tasks for the immediate future:

“Confronted with fascist and racist violence, there is no room for complacency. The antifascist movement and the large democratic community, whose uprising forced the state authorities in 2013 to initiate criminal proceedings against the Nazi criminal organization Golden Dawn, must be on the alert.
We continue the judicial battle in the Court of Appeal for the final conviction of the criminal organization with the highest possible sentences, aware that fascism will be crushed by a mass, grassroots, majority, anti-fascist movement of workers and youth inside and outside the courts”.

Photo Gallery: That was Palivision

Impressions of the Palivision concert for people who wanted to observe the Eurovision boycott. AlHamra, Berlin, Saturday 11th May 2024


 

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All photos: Cherry Adam. You can see more of Cherry’s photography here

Statement from Teachers at Berlin Universities

Open Letter in support of the Right to Protest signed by over 1,000 educators


14/05/2024

Editor’s Note: On 7th May, authorities at the Freie Univerität (FU) called the police who cleared a Camp for Gaza organised by FU students. In response, teaching staff released this open letter, which over 1,000 educators have since signed. Thanks to the teaching staff for providing theleftberlin with this English language version of their open letter.

As lecturers at Berlin universities, our professional standards require us to stand by our students as equals, ensuring their safety and protection from any form of police violence.

Regardless of whether we agree with the specific demands of the protest camp, we firmly support our students’ right to peaceful protest, including their occupation of university grounds. These are core democratic rights of assembly and expression that must be upheld, especially within academic settings. Given the dire situation in Gaza and the announced bombardment of Rafah, it should be understandable to recognize the urgency behind the protesters’ cause, even if we don’t endorse every detail of their demands or their chosen methods.

Constitutionally protected rights to protest are not contingent on dialogue, but we do believe it’s the duty of university leadership to prioritize dialogue and seek non-violent resolutions whenever possible. Unfortunately, the recent dismantling of the protest camp by the Free University of Berlin (FU Berlin) administration, without prior dialogue, was a breach of this responsibility. The right to peaceful assembly is not conditioned on specific viewpoints and extends to public spaces like the FU Berlin campus, as confirmed by the German Federal Constitutional Court (“Fraport” case).

We urge Berlin university administrations to avoid police interventions and further legal actions against their own students. Dialogue with students and preserving universities as hubs of critical discourse should be paramount, which cannot coexist with police interventions on campus. It is only through open engagement and debate that we, as lecturers and institutions, fulfill our responsibilities.