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Statement on my expulsion from die Linke

My expulsion is a politically motivated response to my activity for Palestine


08/12/2024

Today [Saturday, 7th December 2024] the Landesschiedskommission (District Administration Commisson) of die Linke expelled me from the party with immediate effect upon request by Katina Schubert and Martin Schirdewan.

I would like to reply to this decision with the following statement:

Although the charges levied against me were refuted in the hearing, the same unsubstantiated allegations were once more used as justification for my expulsion, and their refutation was ignored.

One of the main arguments for my expulsion was that there had been a media campaign waged against me because of my activities in support of Palestine solidarity, which resulted in institutions questioning cooperation with die Linke.

While the oral argumentation of the decision certified that no accusations of antisemitism had been made and that I had inflicted no intentional damage to die Linke, I was expelled with immediate effect.

The oral argumentation shows the political motivation of the Landesschiedskommission. My conviction that all people should have the same rights, whether they are Jewish, Muslim, or atheist, was dismissed as a “beautiful dream”.

The Landesschiedskommission is thus following the logic of unconditional support for the State of Israel, in accordance with German Staatsräson, which it has put above the right to existence of and equal rights for Palestinian people.

The current development of the mass killing of the Palestinian civil population, which has also been confirmed by Amnesty International as a genocide, was given no import in the judgement of the context of my statements.

My expulsion cannot be justified, either factually or politically.

The failure of the verdict to acknowledge the most recent decision of the International Criminal Court is a damning indictment of a left, internationalist party. It inflicts damage upon everyone who is fighting for universal human rights.

I thank everyone within and external to die Linke who have shown solidarity with me in recent weeks, and who have exposed themselves to the danger of media defamation. Their presence at the rally that took place at the proceedings showed me that I am not alone. Many thanks for this.

I will continue to do everything possible with comrades within and external to die Linke to build the solidarity movement with Palestine. The delivery of weapons for Israel’s genocide in Gaza must be ended. Human rights are indivisible – that is more than a “beautiful dream”. Let us stand up for them together:

This statement first appeared in German. Translation: Phil Butland. Reproduced with permission

Book Review – “Environmental Warfare in Gaza”

From Colonial Ecology to Weaponized Ecocide


Shourideh Molavi’s latest book, released earlier this year, is a historical journey through the wars and incursions on Gaza aiding us in developing our understanding of their impacts on Gaza’s built and cultivated environments.. Molavi serves as the lead researcher for Palestine at Forensic Architecture (FA) at Goldsmiths, University of London. The field of forensic architecture works on “spatial evidence within legal, political, and cultural contexts, and takes architecture to include not only buildings, but shaped environments of cities and territories.”

The research agency’s work has been used as evidence in courts and in citizens’ tribunals across the world, combining techniques such as spatial modeling and audio and video documentation of state violence and violations of human rights. In its investigations of states and corporate entities, Forensic Architecture says it wants to aid the legal and public struggle against “historical and contemporary colonial violence, including the destruction of traditional environments and life worlds.”

In “ Environmental Warfare in Gaza”, Molavi builds on her previous investigations along Gaza’s Eastern “border”, which she extends to cover the colonial history of Palestine’s environment.

Over years, Israel widened the “protective” zone along its borders, progressively reducing the arable land by flattening the land through airstrikes and bulldozers. In recent years, this process has been extended through the deliberate targeting of lands with high concentrations of pesticides, sprayed alongside the fence onto Gazan farmlands, creating the perfect “buffer zone.”Molavi concludes that this so-called “no-go zone,” ranging from 300-1000 meters, turns Gaza’s border into the ideal “one-sided” border, allowing for permeation from one side only. This constantly affects the livelihood of Palestinians in proximity to the border.

To clear the view on protestors and agriculturalists alike, specific types of plants were criminalized due to their height or banned from the environment altogether. . Whereas crops up to 80 cm height were permitted in earlier years, the Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights reported that by 2018 farmers were forced to reduce the height of their plants to only 40 cm (~15 in) (Molavi 2024, 33).

These enforced changes to the agricultural environment include citrus orchards, central to Gaza’s role as a coastal trade hub. Molavi notes that the role of the orange in the “formation of Gazan identity, including local knowledge production, socio-economic relations and migration patterns, domestic and international cultural exchange. . . is largely under-studied” (p. 27). we do know, however, that Gazan traditional citrus cultivation is closely linked to the Palestinian Nakba or “catastrophe”. Thousands of families lost access to fruit orchards and vegetable plots that lay beyond today’s militarized borders. After they became refugees and settled in Gaza, many Palestinians had to adapt to an urban lifestyle. Only a small percentage of Gazans today cultivate farmland, much of which is owned by a small percentage of large-scale landowners.

Similarly, Gaza lost many of its olive groves, often near the “buffer zone” due to clearing processes by Israel or the prohibition of taller plants. Oxfam estimates that Israel uprooted roughly 112,000 olive trees between 2000 and 2008. In addition to their symbolism, olive trees have provided Gazan grove keepers and their families with an income, and served as a critical food source during curfew-times imposed by the Israeli army in the form of oil and olives.

Early in Israel’s ongoing genocide on Gaza, many Gazans had to cut down trees for firewood to survive the winter. Gazans stress the loss they felt and the role these trees, many of which were inherited, had in their lives.

From 2017 to 2019, Gazans protested for their internationally recognized Right of Return (UNGA Res. 194 (III)). In these years the cleared and flattened area near the fence enabled the targeting and injuring of thirty six thousand Gazans, who resorted to burning tires and utilizing the toxic smoke to take cover from snipers. Roughly 29% of these injuries were brought on by live ammunition and rubber bullets, leading to many Gazans undergoing amputations. Especially for small-scale farmers, this can mean the loss of their livelihoods.

Investigations of the pesticides sprayed by Israel onto Gazan lands have resulted in the conclusion that the while plants subjected to the deliberate spraying of herbicides along Gaza’s borders showed traces of insecticides and pesticides, “damaging levels of herbicides were not detected” (Molavi 2024, 72) by the consulting Katif Center Laboratories. Contrary to these findings, farmers reported severe losses of crops, and resorted to planting different crops, often resorting to cultivation in greenhouses to shield them from herbicides. This shift changed the landscape and removed Gazan people’s access to ancestral foods and traditions, such as foraging Khobeiza (Palestinian Common Mallow) and grazing animals on the land.

Palestinian filmmaker and artist Emily Jacir questioned FA’s approach in her film Letter to a Friend (2019), dedicated to FA founder Eyal Weizmann. Given often repeated crimes in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, ranging from extrajudicial executions to war crimes and crimes against humanity in connection with global arms exporting firms, Jacir raises the question: why does her friend’s focus remain on proving that a crime has been committed instead of working to prevent it from being repeated or exacerbated?

Jacir’s Letter to a Friend can nourish movements for social and ecological justice and calls for the proactive protection and defense of lives and livelihoods. This call could form the basis of more strictly enforced policies determining what will harm the environment and local populations and inform new ways of preventing the crimes. This very necessity of protecting the soils and livelihoods from being weaponized to create scarcity can connect movements for a joint cause and a more just future.

In Verfassungsblog: On Matters Constitutional, Saeed Bagheri, Lecturer in International Law at the University of Reading School of Law, writes that “the natural environment remains the silent victim of Israel’s war on Gaza.” He highlights the Israeli military’s stance towards the environmental destruction it is causing in Gaza: while there is a military necessity to clear areas, “there appears to be little evidence of ‘widespread, long-term, and severe environmental damage’ from Israel’s air strikes on the heavily civilian-populated Gaza.”

Bagheri argues that Israel is using the “widespread, long-term, and severe” standard — an ambiguous international standard of humanitarian law — in combination with the inability of scientists to undertake careful studies of air, water, and soil quality, to screen its enormously damaging impacts in Gaza.

Even though Palestinian and Lebanese farmers, as well as international researchers have provided evidence of widespread environmental destruction over decades, we must not wait until the accepted evidence of an already destroyed environment surpasses military need. Under the precautionary principle, the burden of proof lies with the party profiting from the actions. That is why some researchers advocate for the use of the precautionary principle in armed conflict. They assert that although under International Humanitarian Law the focus rests on “all feasible precautions,” the precautionary principle provides protective guidelines and takes parts of the decision out of the hands of military personnel.

Some, like Bagheri, do not think that this is enough. Already in April 2024, six months after the start of Israel’s genocide on Gaza, Bagheri said that “the UN, in general, and the ICC in particular, should have done more to attenuate the substantial risk of mistreatment of the natural environment, concerning more particularly the ecology, health and survival of Palestinians.”

This sentiment is shared by many and goes far beyond the ongoing genocide—those who read Shourideh Molavi’s research closely will see that an intervention should have long preceded the currently ongoing destruction, given the vast amount of evidence provided.

Environmental Warfare in Gaza is an essential book to understand the ongoing war on Gaza. Following the acknowledgements that reflect Molavi’s many years of collaboration with her local colleagues, she pays tribute to her collaborator Roshdi Yahya Al-Sarraj, co-founder of the investigation’s journalistic partner organization, Ain Media Gaza, who was killed in an airstrike on his home.

Since the book’s release early this year, much has changed. Molavi, has re-edited her book to include the newest developments, but she could not have predicted the destruction that has been brought upon Gaza since. As she continues to investigate Israel’s crimes in Gaza and the continued ecocide in Gaza that enhances the famine, one section of the book brings us closer to the people and the future of Gaza:

“Refusing to limit her output to low-growing fruits and vegetables, Mona would strategically place olive trees among her crops. […] Responding to the forced biopolitical modifications of [the] otherwise familiar landscape, such acts of resistance interrupt the colonial and imperial gaze, also emphasizing the inextricable role of the environment in modern warfare.” (p.43)

Like the farmers interviewed by Molavi in 2018, the people of Gaza still refuse to be helpless in the face of a man-made famine. Initiatives such as Thamra have resorted to planting amidst the ruins to have access to food independent of the arrival of aid. Before evacuating, Yousef Abu Rabea, a Palestinian farming engineer and co-founder of Thamra, collected seeds from his family’s farm in Beit Lahia.

Thamra’s aim is to promote food stability, but Abu Rabea remained concerned: “The genocide has left the farmland all but devastated by artillery-borne white phosphorus, a potent carcinogen that lingers in the soil, poisoning farmers and making their crops unsafe to eat.” On October 7, 2024, new evacuation orders for Gaza’s North were issued, and bombing of densely populated areas of the North increased. Yousef Abu Rabea was killed by an Israeli drone strike on October 21, 2024.

While most research on effects of discharged ordnance focuses on the effects of white phosphorus on the human body, investigations by the American University of Beirut are also underway to better understand the result of soil contamination in South Lebanon’s targeted areas.

Although white phosphorus is officially an incendiary agent., it is clear that in the case of Gaza and Lebanon it is used beyond its official purpose of illumination. Nonetheless, white phosphorus is not yet deemed a chemical weapon, even thoughthe United States’ National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health already states that absorption of white phosphorus by means of ingestion is possible for humans and grazing animals because of soil and plant contamination.

Many insist that conclusive investigations can only be done after the end of Israel’s attack on Lebanon and Gaza, but Lebanese farmers have already lost thousands of trees due to white phosphorus fires. Previous attacks with white phosphorus have led to diminished harvests and contaminated streams. Earlier research has linked white phosphorus particles in Alaska’s Eagle River Flats to the death of thousands of waterfowl.

In a recent blog post published by the Earth Law Center, an ecocentric legal organization based in Durango, Colorado, Elena Tiedens concluded that where the precautionary principle fails to prevent damage done to the environment, ecocide is a path through which the destruction of the environmentcould be persecuted and punished. Subsequently, co-violations to human rights could – and should – be approached from this angle too, bringing justice to those whose livelihoods and health have been destroyed in the near and far future.

Ecocide in Gaza is not just a local issue. Most recently, Reuters’ reported on how the release of asbestos through urban bombing will affect the health of generations to come. In the words of Cenk Tan, ecocide is “a phenomenon that has serious international impact. It represents humanity’s toll on Earth.”

 

Book details: Environmental Warfare in Gaza, , Shourideh C. Molavi Pluto Press February 2024

“The Netherlands is following Germany in its increasing oppression”

Interview with Daan de Grefte and Juul Seesing about why the ELSC is taking the Dutch government to court


07/12/2024

Thanks for talking to us. Could you each briefly introduce yourselves?

Daan de Grefte (DdG): I am based in Amsterdam, and I am a Senior Legal Officer at the European Legal Support Center (ELSC). It’s a non-profit organization that protects and empowers the Palestine solidarity movement in Europe through legal means. My specific role is to lead the Crimes and Complicity team. The buzzword term would be strategic litigation, but it also encompasses other work, like advocacy and building coalitions.

Juul Seesing (JS): I work as the advocacy and communications officer for the Netherlands at ELSC. When people are faced with any form of repression while advocating for Palestinian rights, we ask them to report this to us. This can vary from facing police violence to an employer wanting to silence you, for example. We can connect people to our networks of lawyers if need be, but we also gather evidence to expose and challenge the oppression in Europe. When any communication or outreach is required, then that is my job.

We mainly want to talk about your latest piece of strategic litigation. You’re taking the Dutch government to court. Could you explain why you’re doing this?

DdG: The Dutch government has been complicit in Israel’s colonization of Palestine and the oppression of the Palestinian people for a very long time. This does not only relate to political support, but also economic support, military support and political cover and backing, especially to shield Israel from criticism on the international stage.

After October 7th, it became apparent that Israel was not only committing more basic war crimes and violations of Palestinian human rights, but also the crime of genocide, which is of a much more severe nature. The Dutch government has continued to unconditionally support the Israeli government, even when its ministers are under investigation by the International Criminal Court.

The recent F35 motor parts case involved the Dutch government exporting F35 parts to Israel that could then be used in its genocidal assault in Gaza, even though there was a very clear risk of serious violations of international law and potentially the risk of being complicit in the actual commission of the crime of genocide. The government has never conditioned any kind of economic or military support on Israel’s respect for international humanitarian law.

Besides this, there’s the long standing problem of what the Dutch government calls the “ontmoedigingsbeleid”, the discouragement policy, where the official line of the Dutch government has always been, “we discourage companies from doing business with illegal Israeli settlements, but we do not take an active role in it”.

If you are a company and you come to the Dutch government with a request for information on the legality of Israeli settlements, then they would advise you about what it actually means under international law, but they do not preclude you whatsoever from doing business with settlements. Even though, in July 2024, the International Court of Justice ruled that third states, including the Netherlands, have a legal obligation to take steps to prevent trade with settlements.

Our interpretation of this advisory opinion is extremely clear. We think that the Dutch government is now under an obligation to actively stop any trade with Israeli settlements because they are clearly conducive to the illegal situation that has unfolded in Palestine at the hands of Israel.

Our case of strategic litigation has the primary goal of doing whatever we can here in the Netherlands to stop the genocide from continuing to take place in Gaza. On the other hand, we are also trying to challenge the Dutch government’s discouragement policy, which effectively still allows trade with settlements, even though the world’s highest court has clearly banned it.

JS: The Dutch state argues that there’s no international or domestic legislation that prohibits Dutch corporations from doing business in Israeli settlements, disregarding its own International Crimes Act. The Dutch government isn’t even complying with its own laws.

DdG: In our proceedings against the Dutch state, which is broader than that F35 case, the Dutch government alluded to their policy having changed, saying that they actually do not export any weapons that can be used in Israel’s assault on Gaza any more. That was news for us. They never said that before, even though we repeatedly asked for any kind of updates on their policy about delivering weapons to Israel.

But it seems very strange, because in the meantime, they are still appealing this decision that tells them to do exactly that.

When the Dutch government says that they’re not sending weapons to Gaza, do you believe them?

DdG: To be very honest with you, I don’t. The Dutch government is making every effort to make it as un-transparent as possible for us to know exactly what kind of arms are being sent to Israel, and especially which kind of arms might be used in Gaza. They do publish overviews of the type of export licenses they give, but it is not really certain if they encompass all licenses because, for example, the F35 parts are not even on any of those lists.

There are other issues with the list because it’s quite unclear where any of the dual-use goods are used. These are goods that can be used for both civilian and military purposes. It is completely unclear whether or not there is a risk that they end up being used in Gaza, even though the term dual-use means that there should be at least a risk of them being used for military purposes.

My personal opinion is that I don’t think we should believe what the government is saying.

JS: In the F35 case the Court of Appeal ordered the government not to send F35 parts to the occupation. However, it became clear that F35 parts were still being exported to the occupation but via the United States. That says it all. You can’t trust the government, even after a court order.

DdG: Our case differs from the F35 case in a very important aspect. We do not think that only offensive weapons that can be used in Gaza should be banned. Of course, we think that those weapons should also not be exported to Israel. But we think that the ICJ advisory opinion made it very clear that third states, like the Dutch state, cannot be involved in any way in the illegal situation that Israel has created in Palestine, which means the occupation, the settlements, or anything that is related to them.

On that basis, we think that defensive weapons can also contribute to the occupation. That’s not a very difficult argument to make. But even on top of that, it is very clear that states can in no way be involved in the commission of the crime of genocide and should do whatever is in their power to prevent it from happening when there is a risk.

What are your chances of winning the case?

DdG: This case is politically very sensitive. It touches upon the Dutch foreign policy, where it has to operate through alliances, and there are many geo-strategic and geopolitical considerations that the Dutch government has to take into account. That makes it difficult for judges, especially in the first instance, because it’s just one judge, who potentially upsets Dutch foreign policy.

In the appeal court, it’s different. It’s a three judge system there. They also have a little bit more authority to make decisions that touch upon Dutch foreign policy, but we know that it is very scary for judges to make a decision like this. That, in combination with the fact that it is a case about Palestine, which is always very difficult to win in court.

However, all our research, all our expertise from the people in the coalition and independent advisors have pointed towards the fact that legally, it is extremely clear what the Dutch government has to do, and those are adequately described in our demands.

During the hearing last Friday, it became very clear that the Dutch government actually does not really have a clear policy on this, and that they don’t really have a strong argument to present to the courts to say, what they are doing is adequate to prevent genocide and to prevent other violations of international law.

So I think that there is a very strong chance that in an appeal, and potentially before the Highest Court, we would actually win this case. But it’s very hard to predict. These cases take a long time. It really depends also on what the judge themself thinks. It depends on all kinds of other information that we do not have.

And if you do in either the case or the appeal, what are the implications for countries outside the Netherlands?

DdG: The potential impact of this case for other jurisdictions could potentially be quite big. Of course, the Dutch court does not have any authority over the German legal system or the French legal system. But it does indicate that there is a development happening in the legal system that, under current international law, it is legally impossible for European governments to act as they are currently acting.

You’re not the first people to take the Dutch government to court. There have been environmental actions. Is there something specific about the Dutch legal system or Dutch activism, which makes this more common?

DdG: It’s important to understand that there is this provision in Dutch law. Our tort legislation gives us the opportunity to establish unlawfulness of the conduct of the Dutch state, not only because it is violating certain prescribed legislation, but also because it could violate a certain unwritten norm of fundamental societal value. This allows for international norms to be used to explain those societal values.

This is what happened in the case against Shell, which was litigated recently in the Netherlands. The judges upheld the fact that international norms, like the Paris Accords, can be used to explain this unwritten societal norm.

Article One of the Genocide Convention says that states should do whatever is in their power to prevent genocide when there’s a risk of it occurring. Also, Article One of Geneva Conventions states that third states should do whatever they can to ensure respect for international law.

I think that it’s a very strong argument that since these norms are so fundamental to the functioning of the international legal system and the international rule of law, coupled with the fact that the Dutch state is, of course, home to the ICC and the ICJ. It is a very fundamental value to Dutch society as a whole to respect those norms. That is where I think the Dutch legal system is unique, as it offers that opportunity.

Do you think that the fact that the Netherlands doesn’t have a constitutional court, and so doesn’t test their laws against a standard, is also part of this?

DdG: The fact that we don’t have a constitutional court is one of the reasons that judges actually get to test the constitutionality of certain laws and policies in the first place. It is always a very difficult and sensitive thing for a judge to rule that a certain act or policy of the government is unconstitutional, because it will always have quite significant effects in society.

But our Constitution says very clearly that the Dutch government has to take a proactive role in the progressive development of international law and the international rule of law.

The Dutch government’s argument at this point is that they can go against an ICJ advisory opinion and not link any consequences to the fact that Israel is in active violation of ICJ rulings, when their constitution says that they should be vanguards in the development of international law and the international rule of law.

Going back to the Shell case that you mentioned, this has been recently overturned. Is this something that could happen to you as well?

DdG: The reasons for overturning the first instance decision on Shell were related to both practical and factual considerations. For example, the court ruled that it was not made sufficiently clear that the effects of Shell taking action on climate change would be one to one translatable into a reduction of CO2 emissions.

It therefore said that the 45% norm cannot be made to directly apply to Shell, because there is a chance that if Shell does not do it, other companies will do it. I think this is bizarre reasoning, by the way. This is what people usually call the drug dealer justification: if I don’t deal these drugs, someone else will do it. It’s bizarre that the court would make that argument.

But what is very positive about this reasoning is that the courts very explicitly upheld the principle that these international norms can be transposed into a Dutch court.

Let’s get into wider Dutch politics. Recently, Maccabi Tel Aviv fans rioted in Amsterdam. We had some bizarre reporting in Germany. How was the media response in the Netherlands?

JS: It was just as bad as in Germany, I’m sure. The mainstream media in the Netherlands is a far cry from the watchdog journalists are supposed to be. They follow the framing of the racists in the Dutch government usually without question.

On the night of November 7–8th, Netanyahu already spoke of a pogrom in the city of Amsterdam, and even compared it to Kristallnacht. This was at 3am, while the authorities in Amsterdam were still collecting facts and figuring out what happened.

With that first statement, Israel set the frame of a pogrom night in Amsterdam. The mayor of Amsterdam fell for that trap, the Hasbara trap. All of this was a huge gift for the racist wannabe-fascist Dutch government, unofficially led by the convicted racist Geert Wilders, who has been convicted for discrimination against Moroccan people. They were looking for weapons to discriminate against the Muslim population and people with a migrant background in general in the Netherlands anyway, and now they found it. Then the mainstream media followed that frame without any critical thoughts, as most state media do.

DdG: Our prime minister held a press conference after all this unfolded, and said that this shows that in the Netherlands, we have an integration problem. This is a very weird way of spinning what happened when people came to the Netherlands shouting “we want to kill Arabs”, and the Arabs got angry about that.

Our politicians in power also said that what happened in Amsterdam was done at the hands of ‘multicultural scum’. I’m translating literally. I don’t want to make sensationalist comparisons, but this kind of rhetoric is usually the prelude to an insane amount of repression against minority populations.

We can already see that there is much more violence against people from a Muslim or immigrant background. We can see that racists are emboldened by what the Prime Minister has said. There are so many indications for this.

JS: When it comes to antisemitism, both the politicians and the media in the Netherlands keep equating antisemitism with anti-Zionism, and I am pretty sure that at the very least for politicians, that is an intentional choice.

When it comes to mainstream media, they are just following the statements without any critical journalistic eye. This makes the mainstream media complicit in manufacturing consent for the genocide that’s going on, and for the descent into fascism which the Netherlands is experiencing now.

In the middle of this witch hunt, the Amsterdam mayor, who had initially talked about pogroms, retracted her statement. What made her change her mind?

JS: I can’t look inside her head, but I think that she saw how the word pogrom was weaponised against Amsterdammers, both by the Israeli government and by the Dutch government. She is still a liberal mayor and didn’t want to openly discriminate against people in her own city. I think that that’s why she retracted that word specifically.

DdG: A lot of pushback was given to her from civil society and other organizations, including anti-Zionist Jewish organizations, who really do not like their protection being abused for political purposes to create this atmosphere of hostility towards another minoritised people.

JS: Obviously, it is not just the mayor of Amsterdam who spreads Israeli propaganda; it is a common thing for the ruling class to do. What she should have done in that first press conference on November 8th was to keep it very factual.

It was very clear right from the start that there was a huge group of genocide supporters, and even perpetrators, who were unleashed on the streets of Amsterdam and terrorized the streets without the police doing anything about it. Amsterdammers basically defended their own city.

Do you think that the incident with the Maccabi fans will have any impact on your case against the government, either positive or negative?

DdG: I don’t think it would have a direct influence, but it could have a small, maybe significant, indirect effect.

JS: If the legal system works as it’s supposed to work, the judge is not influenced by external events. It doesn’t really have anything to do with our case except that it relates to Palestine. Those are two separate events. But you never really know. Judges are people as well at the end of the day.

What are the next steps in your case?

JS: The ruling will be on December 13th. Then we will know what the outcome is of the preliminary injunction.

DdG: After December 13th, the clock starts running to file the appeal. If the judge does not agree with us, we will file an appeal. And I’m quite sure that if the judge does not agree with the state, it will also file an appeal. In mid-February, maybe March, there will be another hearing, and after that, another judgement.

How can people in Germany follow what’s happening and support you?

JS: We have a fundraiser, and we publish updates on our social media channels. We are most active on Instagram. So keep an eye on our Instagram and website.

The case is also covered by mainstream media. But it is best to hear about it firsthand haha. So I would say just go to our channels.

Is there anything you’d like to say before we finish?

JS: In the aftermath of November 7-8yh there was a demonstration ban which was in direct violation of Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which resulted in vicious police violence. It is really important to counter the narrative in terms of the criminalization of the Palestine solidarity movement in the Netherlands. We have to push back against this. 

We see that the Netherlands is following Germany in its increasing oppression. We see the same playbook to some degree. For example, Samidoun was criminalized here two months ago, and the government wants to ban it. It is banned in Germany already.

On Friday 22 November the Dutch government released a report on fighting antisemitism, which basically is a tool to discriminate against people of migrant background and Muslims. In 2025, they will try to push through legislation that is very discriminatory and fascist. They want to be able to take away somebody’s Dutch citizenship if they are antisemitic, where “antisemitic” means being critical of Israel. Germany has already gone down that path and the Netherlands is following now.

DdG: The failure to challenge Israeli oppression of Palestinians and to take adequate action results in fascism being imported into Europe. Taking away the nationality of people who are convicted of antisemitic offences is a very good illustration of that. It would never happen for any kind of other offence. But it is extremely clearly linked to the fact that Europe is highly complicit in what’s happening in Palestine.

It’s also not a surprise that all the right-wing politicians in the Netherlands, who would rather see the Dutch rule of law deteriorate in order to further their racist goals, are also very close friends and very politically aligned with those in Israel who are trying to do the exact same thing when it comes to the oppression of Palestinians.

Because of our complicity, because of our reluctance to act, we are now importing fascism from Israel to Europe. And it’s a very worrying trend. It should be more visible to people that this is happening and that we are on the verge of copying the things that Israel is doing in Europe.

Questions by Phil Butland and Jitske Grift

Macron has Strengthened Fascists, but Barnier’s Fall Opens Space to Fight Back

Three months after Macron chose a Prime Minister from a party which lost the elections, The Left brought his government down with a no-confidence vote


06/12/2024

France’s July 2024 elections gave us a parliament split into three big blocs: the centre-right around Macron, the fascists of the Rassemblement National (RN), and the left alliance of the New Popular Front (NPF). This last group is dominated by the radical left France Insoumise (FI). The Left bloc had more MPs than either of the other two blocs, but Macron’s main aim was to avoid a government with a radical programme. He named Michel Barnier from the traditional French right as Prime Minister, hoping the fascist MPs would give enough support for the government to survive since the French constitution does not allow new parliamentary elections until next July. You can read a further explanation of the situation until then in this interview from October.

The Barnier government has been dominated by accelerating austerity plans, aiming to slash public spending by a further €60 billion. Macron’s manoeuvres allowed the fascists of the RN to gain respectability and establishment sympathy for their supporting role. Barnier appointed hard right anti-immigrant ministers such as Bruno Retailleau to appease the RN. And his government continued to stoke Islamophobia, for example confirming the ban on long “Abaya” dresses which are considered to look Muslim, from high schools. But in early December, the RN decided to vote in favour of the no-confidence motion put forward by the left alliance.

Once he realized his government was likely to fall, Barnier desperately tried to talk MPs round, squealing about how Brussels would be upset and how international bankers would punish France. President Macron, meanwhile, was in Saudi Arabia on the day of the vote, modelling designer sunglasses and selling fighter jets. Macron has been pretending to be above the storm; in recent months he has squeezed every last bit of sparkle he could from the Olympic Games and the reopening of Notre Dame cathedral, hoping that this will hide his role as salesman for the grubby forces of profit. 

A few voices on the Left are saying it was a mistake to support a parliamentary motion which the fascists were also going to vote for. This is a dangerous error, since fascist parties are not honest or principled, such a position would leave us to be bounced around by their whims. Of course, Macronist leaders in parliament this week were eager to pretend that the fascists and the radical left were now bosom buddies. 

What actually happened was that the fascists were forced to vote for a no-confidence motion which included a clear denunciation of last year’s racist immigration law, described in the text as “vile” and “morally bankrupt”. In his opening speech for the motion, Eric Coquerel of the FI denounced the concessions made to the RN, insisting that taxing the rich has to be at the centre of politics, expressing his support for the strike movements starting up, and called for Macron to be impeached. Marine Le Pen, in her speech immediately following that of Coquerel, defended entrepreneurship, cutting taxes, and attacked immigrants while opposing the impeachment of Macron.

The fall of Barnier is a victory for the Left. The NPF alliance, as the biggest group of MPs, should be allowed to form a government, and this is what FI is demanding. The alliance has a radical programme and a compromise candidate for PM, Lucie Castets, ready. 

The day after the no-confidence vote, Macron made a solemn speech to the nation which may go down in history as the emptiest speech of the century. He simply insisted that the far Right and the Left do not care about ordinary people, but he does.

Macron is now faced with a choice of three options, since he refuses to resign. He could respect democracy and allow the Left to form a government. He could name a new right wing PM even more open to working with the fascists than the previous one was. Or he could try one more time to split the left alliance and draw some Socialist and Green Party MPs into a Left-Right joint government.

Fragile unity

The left alliance is holding for the time being, but is fragile. The right wing of the Socialist Party is looking for a way out. In September, the party’s national committee voted 38 to 33 to stay in the alliance. But polls show that a third of Socialist Party voters did not want Barnier to fall, and 5 of their 62 MPs refused to vote him down, so the party’s right wing feels they have room to manoeuvre. Continuing the huge smear campaign against Mélenchon and FI, accusing them of being antisemitic and supporters of terrorism, is an important part of their tactics, and this campaign is cheerfully supported by most of the media.

In the Green Party and the Communist Party there are also groupings which are unhappy with the radicalism of the NPF compromise programme, and fearful that the FI will continue to grow in size and influence. They are looking for ways of moving rightward. Yannick Jadot, one of the most influential Green leaders, announced on national radio on Thursday that he did not want Macron to resign. Unwilling to openly criticize the left programme, these groups are saying that another prime ministerial candidate, less opposed to Macron than Lucie Castets is, would be a good move. But these various manoeuvres are very unlikely to produce a viable Left-Right government any time soon.

And the centre of gravity of the Left remains the France Insoumise. In recent months its MPs have been aiming to keep in debate the major issues concerning working people. For example they presented a bill to reverse last year’s raising of the standard retirement age (Macron’s MPs had to resort to obstructive tactics to prevent a vote taking place). Another bill would have abolished the crime of “making statements in support of terrorism”, an offence which in reality has been mostly used against environmental activists, pro-Palestine leaders and trade unionists.

On the ground, some claim there are now over 400,000 people in the local FI action groups. This is probably an exaggeration, but it is certainly the biggest activist network for a number of decades. Since it is a left reformist grouping, much emphasis is of course placed on elections, but FI action groups are very much involved in the movement against the genocide in Gaza. Each local group has a large amount of autonomy. FI activities near me include mobilizing in support of homeless migrant groups occupying buildings for shelter, organizing a “know your rights” caravan to tour housing estates, collecting for foodbanks, and so on. In a nearby town, FI groups initiated leafleting of schools in order to marginalize a far right group of “vigilant parents” who were fomenting hatred against trans people and other LGBT+ groups. 

In voting for the no-confidence motion, the RN insisted they were defending ordinary people from the budget cuts which would reduce retirement pensions, as well as from the rise in electricity prices. But recent months have only confirmed their horrifically reactionary core ideas, as they argued to suppress all sex education in schools, and as a “right-wing feminist” group called Nemesis with links to the RN hit the news for their campaign to claim that immigration is the main cause of sexual violence.

Combativity and the need for spectacular change

Whoever Macron chooses to replace Barnier, resistance to austerity is ongoing. On Thursday 5th of December a one-day strike in the public sector saw at least two thirds of primary school teachers walk out, as well as waste workers, local authority staff and more. Two hundred thousand demonstrated around the country. From the 11th of December, rail strikes are planned. Even university presidents are in revolt against budget cuts in higher education. Meanwhile the private sector has seen a wave of redundancy announcements in recent weeks. Tyre manufacturer Michelin, hypermarket chain Auchan, and car company Valeo are among those who announced factory closures. 

The crisis in France is entering a new phase. It is necessary both to insist that Macron respect democracy and allow a Left government, and to build the strike movements. The anti-austerity strikes (teachers are opposing attacks on the right to sick leave; rail workers are fighting the privatization of freight trains) are crucial. Ways need to be discussed to link this combativity to a political vision and strategy for “spectacular change” (to use Mélenchon’s expression). Marxists should have plenty of ideas to bring to these debates.

Reflections on a year of grief, care, and liberation

Looking after each other is a revolutionary act


04/12/2024

Makeshift dwellings on Gaza's coast. Marcin Monko (2007), Wikimedia Commons.

It is now November 2024, a year since the genocide in Palestine began. Like many others, my life has been profoundly transformed by the events of the past year. I have felt extreme grief, rage, sadness, anxiety, and despair. For a year now, I’ve been disoriented, dysregulated, unwell, and struggling to comprehend how this could be happening. Since the genocide began I’ve been living in Berlin, a city that has also faced brutal repression and violence from the German state for solidarity with Palestine.

In the first six months, I attended many protests with my partner and friends. We spoke constantly about what was happening, reading, listening, and engaging in whatever way we could. But like so many others, I started to burn out. The constant repression, apathy, and overwhelming grief and rage left me exhausted. My partner and I began to talk about how we couldn’t sustain this momentum any more. I started dissociating, numbing myself from the constant onslaught of horrifying images and news, both from Palestine and from what was happening here. I felt closed off and distant, emotionally drained, and in desperate need of support.

In the midst of this, I found refuge in spaces of care. I always understood that such spaces are vital for our movements, but I didn’t truly feel this until I experienced it first-hand. One space that has been especially healing for me is the Bodywork Community Salon, a weekly, free, queer-run bodywork clinic in Berlin offering support to Palestinians, activists, and allies affected by the genocide. I’ve visited this space numerous times over the past few months, and it has become a sanctuary. The offerings vary each week—massages, cranial work, somatic trauma healing, NADA acupuncture, and an apothecary stocked with local herbal remedies. All of it is free.

Each time I enter the salon, I am greeted with warmth and genuine care. The practitioners meet me where I am, offering bodywork and time to rest. Afterward, I often visit the apothecary, where I can speak openly about my needs, and always find a remedy. The experience of receiving care without the exchange of money, as a means of sustaining the struggle for liberation is something I have always longed for. In a world where urgency often overrides our ability to slow down, this space has encouraged me to rest and heal—something so vital in these times of crisis.

The care I’ve received here has not only nurtured my body and heart but also reignited my hope. The practitioners are offering their time and energy freely, which has inspired me to think about new ways to care for others. It has expanded my capacity for giving, which is essential to sustaining a movement. In a time of profound grief, the care we offer one another becomes both a refuge and a revolutionary act.

From the beginning of this year, I’ve witnessed an outpouring of community-driven spaces for somatic expression, grief work, free therapy, herbal medicine, peer support, and collective processing. People have been offering care freely, knowing it is necessary to sustain our collective struggle. We recognize that Palestine’s liberation is inextricably linked to the liberation of all oppressed people. Imperialism, neoliberal capitalism, the expansion of prisons, and the militarization of police—these systems are interconnected, and the fight for Palestine is the fight for us all. This understanding has deepened our commitment to caring for one another in tangible, meaningful ways.

Amidst the catastrophic moment of societal collapse we find ourselves in, I see people creating communities of care outside of the dominant systems. Abolition, as a philosophy and praxis, teaches us the value of radical hope and imagination. In We Do This ‘Til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice, Miriame Kaba writes, “I don’t believe in self-care, I believe in collective care, collectivizing our care, and thinking more about how we can help each other.” Abolition is not just about dismantling harmful systems—it is about building the alternatives that will replace them. Over the past year, I have witnessed these alternatives taking shape, embodied in the care that has become my lifeline.

Community care is vital to any movement because it strengthens our capacity to care for one another, creating a cycle of support. Care reproduces more care. It also allows us to dream of a new world—one in which care is freely given and received. I am reminded that when we prioritize community care as a practice, we are honoring the lineages of care that have come before us. I think of the People’s Free Medical Clinics started in my hometown, Oakland, by the Black Panthers—a revolutionary act of care during the Black liberation movement. These clinics were designed to provide free health services in order to model an alternative to the existing, inequitable healthcare system. I think of mad, disabled, crip, and psychiatric survivor communities who always have had to fight for survival, creating their own networks of care outside of ableist and oppressive systems. We recently witnessed a resurgence of mutual aid initiatives during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, honoring a growing recognition of our interconnectedness and long held lineages of care.

Palestine will be free. Our liberations are interconnected. When we understand that this moment is about freeing us all, we can ignite what is truly important. It is our duty to sustain this movement for the liberation of Palestine. When we create spaces of care—no matter how small—this becomes an act of resistance and a reach toward the possibility of a new world. Despite the ongoing horrors we witness everyday, I will continue fighting for liberation, building new communities of care, and holding onto the belief that the care we dream of is not only possible, but essential to the world we are working to create.