Anarchic update news all over the world - 23.09.2017

Today's Topics:

   
1.  Poland, rozbrat: Enough to squatters! - Statement of WSL and
      Anarchist Federation FA Poznan on regressions Wielkopolskie
      Association of Tenants [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
2.  Freedom news - Argentina: Family of disappeared anarchist
      furious as police raid Mapuche (ca) (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
3.  France, Alternative Libertaire AL - Dossier 1917: The fiasco
      of the Journées de juillet (fr, it, pt) [machine translation]
      (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
4.  anarkismo.net: 2,095 days (and counting) of the strike of
      SINTRADIT-Buga against Cristar SAS by José Antonio Gutiérrez D.
      (ca, fr, it, pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
5.  France, Alternative Libertaire AL - logbook, A Libertarian
      Communist in YPG # 14: "We had an agreement with the Islamic
      State" (fr, it, pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
   
6.  wsm.ie: George Hook, Leo and the place of women in
      patriarchal-capitalist Ireland (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)


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Message: 1





Another tenant mobilization is necessary. The problem of so-called. recessions . It 
concerns about 430 cases at this time, although perhaps the scale of the phenomenon in 
Poznan is greater. It consists in the fact that, after a court judgment on evictions with 
the allocation to social housing, the waiting tenants must pay compensation for 
non-contractual use of the premises in accordance with the law in force. On the other 
hand, due to long-term negligence, the city could not (and can not) immediately after the 
verdict, indicate the social housing. ---- The tenants waited for five, seven, and in 
extreme cases, even ten years for social housing. At that time the compensation was 
usually in the range of PLN 10.00 to PLN 15.00 per m², although the rent in the social 
property is currently PLN 2.45 per m². Many tenants could not pay such high damages 
(sometimes called "criminal rent") and were indebted, waiting for a social housing.

They could not change their address at that time because they would lose the right to 
social housing, granted to them by the court. At the same time the owners of the premises, 
unable to enforce the "criminal rent" (compensation) from the tenants, demanded that money 
from the city. The city covered these debts, and now demands their return from the tenants 
(hence, in this case we are talking about recourses). The problem is, The tenants would 
never have been indebted to those amounts if they had not waited many years for the city 
to execute a final court judgment granting them the right to social housing. The city did 
not comply with the statutory duty to provide housing to people in need of low incomes, 
which are one of the most important (though not the only) criteria on the basis of which 
the tenants belong to a social housing. For material reasons, residents were not able to 
pay a high fee for an apartment, which, in spite of the logic of the verdicts themselves, 
was demanded from them (in the form of "punitive rent" or "compensation"). At the same 
time, local authorities do not actually bear any responsibility for long-term failure to 
provide social housing. If not for many years waiting for the city to execute the final 
judgments of the courts, granting them the right to social housing. The city did not 
comply with the statutory duty to provide housing to people in need of low incomes, which 
are one of the most important (though not the only) criteria on the basis of which the 
tenants belong to a social housing. For material reasons, residents were not able to pay a 
high fee for an apartment, which, in spite of the logic of the verdicts themselves, was 
demanded from them (in the form of "punitive rent" or "compensation"). At the same time, 
local authorities do not actually bear any responsibility for long-term failure to provide 
social housing. If not for many years waiting for the city to execute the final judgments 
of the courts, granting them the right to social housing. The city did not comply with the 
statutory duty to provide housing to people in need of low incomes, which are one of the 
most important (though not the only) criteria on the basis of which the tenants belong to 
a social housing. For material reasons, residents were not able to pay a high fee for an 
apartment, which, in spite of the logic of the verdicts themselves, was demanded from them 
(in the form of "punitive rent" or "compensation"). At the same time, local authorities do 
not actually bear any responsibility for long-term failure to provide social housing. The 
city did not comply with the statutory duty to provide housing to people in need of low 
incomes, which are one of the most important (though not the only) criteria on the basis 
of which the tenants belong to a social housing. For material reasons, residents were not 
able to pay a high fee for an apartment, which, in spite of the logic of the verdicts 
themselves, was demanded from them (in the form of "punitive rent" or "compensation"). At 
the same time, local authorities do not actually bear any responsibility for long-term 
failure to provide social housing. The city did not comply with the statutory duty to 
provide housing to people in need of low incomes, which are one of the most important 
(though not the only) criteria on the basis of which the tenants belong to a social 
housing. For material reasons, residents were not able to pay a high fee for an apartment, 
which, in spite of the logic of the verdicts themselves, was demanded from them (in the 
form of "punitive rent" or "compensation"). At the same time, local authorities do not 
actually bear any responsibility for long-term failure to provide social housing. who, in 
spite of the logic of the verdicts themselves, were demanded years (in the form of 
"punitive rent"). At the same time, local authorities do not actually bear any 
responsibility for long-term failure to provide social housing. who, in spite of the logic 
of the verdicts themselves, were demanded years (in the form of "punitive rent"). At the 
same time, local authorities do not actually bear any responsibility for long-term failure 
to provide social housing.

The Wielkopolska Association of Tenants (WSL) and the Anarchist Federation of Poznan (FA) 
have consistently been of the opinion that the demand in this case of money tenants for 
non-contractual use of premises is particularly curious and unethical, as well as legally 
questionable. In the spring of last year we were interested in this issue of the Ombudsman 
(ROP). Under the outflow of the ROP opinion, which divided the doubts as to the legitimacy 
of removing recourse from tenants, the city suspended several court proceedings and 
bailiff executions for a dozen or so months. Over the past few weeks, these proceedings 
have resumed, although earlier it was declared that this problem will be settled by the 
relevant resolution of the City Council of Poznan. Such resolutions have never been made.

WSL and FA categorically oppose pulling down regressions and consider it unacceptable that 
the costs of hitherto erroneous social and housing policies in the city of Poznan were 
borne by persons with the lowest financial status. Despite the changes in the city's new 
management, the return to enforcing regressions is a step backward in the city's housing 
policy. Responsible for this are the board and city council and a broader set of interests 
related to real estate developers, banks and tenants. These interests are implicated by 
the prominent politicians in our city of all political options, which - as we see - are 
not interested in major changes in social and housing policies.

This is also the responsibility of the government, which has not changed the hardships of 
tenants in any way so far. In October 2016, a draft amendment to the tenement law was 
introduced at the initiative of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Construction. Changes 
included settlements unfavorable to tenants, among others. allowing the court to freely 
award the right to social housing. Meanwhile, the Act on the Protection of Tenants' Rights 
... in case of pregnant women, sick people, unemployed, children, etc., orders the courts 
to grant social housing. Changing this recipe would have us back to the so- Blidy's law, 
when courts were more arbitrary in adjudicating on the right to social housing, resulting 
in mass "evictions on the pavement". Under the influence of criticism of housing 
organizations, PiS government retreated early this year. From this amendment, but no other 
necessary changes were made at the same time. One of them, written in the abovementioned 
draft amendment, was a provision stating that tenants waiting for a eviction order to pay 
for social security did not pay a "penal rent," but a fee they would have to pay for 
social housing. The introduction of this regulation would make it easier for local 
governments - from a legal point of view - to waive the recovery of rents above the rent 
of a social house. But that did not happen, because the government lost interest in the 
amendment of the law when the tenant organizations protested the rules to facilitate 
"evictions on the pavement". Let's now add that there are currently regulations governing 
the governmental "Apartment +" program. The relevant law is to encourage developers to 
build rental apartments for a "reasonable price", but at the same time allows "evictions 
on the pavement" - in the case of so-called. institutional lease, which can also be used 
by entities so far operating in the rental housing market.

In other words, all political forces, not only do not care about the fate of debtors and 
their displaced tenants, but constantly reach for legal and institutional solutions that 
facilitate the forced displacement of people. In the case of self-governments as well as 
the government, the influence of the developer lobby and apartment owners continues to 
shape the framework of housing policy, which strikes the tenants, especially those with 
lower financial status. Despite the earlier declarations, neither the PiS nor the 
opposition (in particular the PO and .Modern) are, as you can see, interested in the 
fundamental changes on this ground. The action taken by the government and the local 
government is facade, and symbolic at best. Meanwhile, the tenement movement demands 
concrete action to prevent mass displacement, evictions on the pavement, speculation on 
the housing market and cleaning of townhouses. Demand for cheap housing construction for 
rent of a social and public nature, and not "subsidy" developers associated with financial 
institutions.

In the case of regressions, the WSL and the FA ask the Poznan city authorities to make a 
decision on their total remission. In this case we intend to protest to the effect.

Wielkopolska Association of Tenants      www.wsl-poznan.pl
Anarchist Federation s. Poznan     www.rozbrat.org

http://www.rozbrat.org/informacje/poznan/4564-do-nkania-lokatorow-owiadczenie-wsl-i-fa-pozna-ws-regresow

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Message: 2





The brother of Santiago Maldonado publicly denounced the federal government yesterday 
after more than 300 troops from the Special Group of Federal Operations (GEOF) were sent 
into the countryside around Cushamen to "look for him" - 47 days after the solidarity 
activist went missing during a police raid. ---- The heavily-armed GEOF, which specialises 
in counter-terror and anti-narco enforcement, entered the region at 5am with helicopters, 
drones and sniffer dogs under the orders of judge Guido Otranto, the very man who 
originally ordered the raid on July 31st which led to Santiago's disappearance. ---- 
Locals and activists have long held that the police themselves are likely responsible for 
the death of Santiago, who was visiting friends in a community of landless workers who had 
occupied land just outside the town when a raid swept through the area, burning down 
homes. As the group ran to escape, Santiago was separated from them. Witnesses say they 
heard police shout "we have one" and a commotion near one of the vans shortly after.

Right-wing sources have since spread repeated falsehoods about Santiago and the the 
Mapuche community, suggesting that that he was a dangerous militant and that the Mapuche 
could themselves have been responsible for Santiago's disappearance, while Otranto has 
suggested he probably drowned in the river.

Missing: Santiago Monaldo

Speaking from Route 40, at the entrance to the community where the raid was taking place, 
Sergio Maldonado said the action was "all a charade, a setting for the media." Calling the 
police a bunch of criminals, he added:

My fear is that they'll go in there, throw my brother's body somewhere and make up one of 
their many excuses. The judge's statements have been crazy - what are you saying? That my 
brother is dead? If you think my brother drowned (in the river while trying to escape), 
why did they not look there before? What have they been doing all this time? They give 
different stories all the time. The judge is a disgrace.

The timing of Oranto's raid has been heavily questioned, as if the judge really believes 
Santiago drowned then a search should have been conducted within 15 days, otherwise any 
trail would have gone cold and be impossible for dogs to track.

The Mapuche community has been repeatedly raided by police toughs since landless workers 
set up home on what had been their ancestral land before it was bought up by European 
clothes firm Benneton. The violent incursions have led to numerous injuries and extensive 
destruction of property.
http://www.santiagomaldonado.com/

https://freedomnews.org.uk/argentina-family-of-disappeared-anarchist-furious-as-police-raid-mapuche/

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Message: 3





Finally  ! Trained by the Bolshevik base, the anarchists succeeded in provoking an armed 
insurrection. Alas, they do not have the means to bring it to an end. The government 
emerged stronger from the ordeal. ---- On 4 July 1917, at 2 pm, the loyalist troops beat 
the demonstrators on the Nevsky prospect in Petrograd. ---- Photo by Viktor Boulla. ---- 
The Russian offensive on the Austro-German front, which had been conceived as a military 
and political operation, began to flare up in a week. Demoralized soldiers deserted en 
masse ; Kerenski will not get his laurels again from Bonaparte. ---- In Petrograd, the 
red-hot barracks are once again in a state of turmoil. The 1st  regiment of 
machine-gunners learned that two-thirds of its 10,000 soldiers should go to the front [1]. 
At a giant AG, the regiment says he will not accept it when the war has taken a " 
revolutionary  " impossible as long as the capitalists are in power [2].

In Cronstadt, exasperation is such among the 80,000 sailors that a spark would suffice to 
set fire to the powders.

At the Dourna Durnovo, the FAC fomented the insurrection

Iosif Bleikhman (1868-1921)
One of the most influential and mysterious figures of anarchism in Petrograd in 1917-1918. 
An ubiquitous speaker, he is also an insurrectionist in every way, leader of the days of 
July. After taking part in the putsch of October, he will oppose the Bolshevik power. He 
died in deportation in 1921.
Gathered on July 2, some fifteen FAC officials believe that the situation is ripe to 
attempt the coup de force they projected in June. A plan was drawn up: the uprising of the 
gunners and sailors, the occupation of the stations, the telephone exchange, the Novoïe 
Vremia, the arrest of the government. The kick-off is to be given the next day and the 
anarchists are counting on this time to train the Bolshevik base, without allowing the 
central committee of the party time to retain its troops.

That same evening, the House of the People gave a concert to the soldiers who had to go to 
the front. Bleikhman and his comrades burst in. Their harangue against the war and their 
appeal to the immediate insurrection inflame the audience. The concert goes to the 
anti-government meeting.

The following morning, rebelot at the barracks of the 1 st  Mitrailleurs: the FAC and the 
Bolshevik military organization held a meeting and applauded the idea of marching into 
arms on the same day on the Tauride palace, where the government and the Soviet . A 
provisional revolutionary committee was elected, of which the Bolshevik Semashko was 
secretary ; emissaries leave to mobilize Cronstadt and the factories. However, the 
scenario is thin, the organization summary ... "  The street will organize !  " Sweeps 
Bleikhman, faithful to the spontaneous credo of the FAC.

In reality, the street is not going to organize anything at all, and the July insurrection 
is going to end in pudding. The anarchists thought that it would be possible to repeat the 
too easy victory of February. They will pay dearly for this lightness, and the Bolsheviks 
with them.

Trampling in front of the Palace of Taurida

Efim Yartchouk (1886-1937)
This revolutionary of 1905, deported to Siberia, took refuge in the United States where he 
became a revolutionary syndicalist. After his return from exile, he animated the anarchist 
group of Kronstadt. Actor of October, it will then defend the communist dictatorship in 
Volnyi Golos Trouda, between two incarcerations.
On July 3, at 5 pm, from Vyborg, 50,000 workers and soldiers led by Bleikhman and Semachko 
walked to the palace of Tauride and ... nothing, or not much. The Menshevik president of 
the soviet, out to speak to the crowd, is booed. On the other hand, the highly-applauded 
Bolsheviks Trotsky and Zinoviev acclaim the slogan "  all power to the soviets  ". Moment 
of floating. We hesitate. Then an opportune downpour scatters the crowd. The commandos in 
charge of arresting the government failed: Kerensky escaped a little ; the other ministers 
are terrified.

Meanwhile, in Cronstadt, a delegation of machine-gunners and anarchists, including Maria 
Nikiforova , are calling for solidarity during an improvised meeting at the Place de 
l'Ancre. The leaders SR, Bolsheviks (Rochal) and anarcho-syndicalists (Yartchouk) try to 
temporize, explaining that the coup de force is premature [3], but they are whistled. 
Nothing can cool the sailors, who decide to walk the next day.

In the night, the Bolshevik Central Committee tries to decide. The insurrection is 
obviously launched, and the party's base is involved. But should we take Petrograd ? Is 
not this the risk of constituting a red island that will be stifled by the 
counter-revolution ? We dither. Nothing clear is decided.

Maria Spiridonova (1884-1941)
Heroine of the armed struggle against tsarism, she was, in 1917, the main leader of the 
left wing of the PSR.
The next morning, July 4, nearly 20,000 sailors armed to the teeth landed in Petrograd, 
accompanied by brass bands playing The International, aggregating tens of thousands of 
workers. At their head: Bleikhman, left SR Maria Spiridonova and Bolshevik Raskolnikov.

On the way, the crowd masses in front of the Bolshevik HQ, the Hotel Kchessinskaya, hoping 
for a speech by Lenin. The latter, who disapproves of the insurrection, bristles before 
showing himself on the balcony. He does so only to calm, disconcerting the Bolshevik 
adherents who do not understand why their leaders turn their backs on them.

The rest of the day is going to be as confusing as the day before. At the palace of 
Tauride, the crowd insults the Soviet: "  Take power, son of a bitch, since you are given 
it !  " Shouts a sailor in the ears of the chief SR Chernov, who fails to get lynched.

The German Kaiser manipulates the insurgents  !

The insurrection will not go further. The anarchists were only able to give an impulse, 
and the Bolshevik leadership did not wish to direct the course of events. For lack of 
objective, the crowd turns in circles, then finishes to disintegrate at the arrival of the 
loyal troops, in the early afternoon. These regiments hitherto remained neutral were 
convinced to intervene by sensational revelations of the Government of the German 
financing of the Bolshevik Party [4].

This is the beginning of a wave of repression against the extreme left: while the Loyalist 
armored cars patrol in Vyborg, the Bolsheviks and anarchists are ransacked ; they shut 
their newspapers ; search ; the "  traitors to the revolution and to the nation  " are 
imprisoned ; we disarm the units that have mutinied. The right-wing press exults. The time 
for recovery has come.

Guillaume Davranche (AL Montreuil)

In the folder:

February-March 1917: After the Tsarists, drive the capitalists
Minority but galvanized, anarchists advocate expropriation all the way
A tract of the Communist Anarchist Federation of Petrograd (March 1917)
The first libertarian wave (1905-1908)
April-May: The irrepressible rise to the social explosion
Anarcho-syndicalists in factory committees
June-July: Creating insurrection is not enough
The fiasco of the Journées de juillet
August-September: The counter-revolution digs its own tomb
The Other Components of Russian Socialism in 1917
October red (and black): The assault in the unknown
A Ukrainian revolutionary: Maroussia emerges from oblivion
November 1917-April 1918: From pluralism to the confiscated revolution . Four cleavage points:
People's Power vs. State Power
Socialization against nationalization
Popular militia against hierarchical army
On requisitions and expropriations
Epilogue 1918-1921: Resistance and eradication

[1] Orlando Figes, The Russian Revolution t.1, Gallimard, 2009, page 748

[2] Alexander Rabinovitch, Prelude to Revolution. The Petrograd Bolsheviks and the July 
1917 Uprising, Indiana University Press, 1968, p. 119.

[3] P. Gooderham, "  The anarchist movement in Russia, 1905-1917  ", Bristol University, 
1981, p. 250.

[4] This funding from the German government, if proven, seems to have been done mostly 
without the knowledge of the Bolshevik leaders (see Marc Ferro, La Revolution de 1917, 
Albin Michel, 1997, p. 517).

http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Dossier-1917-Le-fiasco-des-Journees-de-juillet

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Message: 4





Although it may seem incredible, for six years a group of local workers, specifically from 
the city of Buga, the city of Madagascar, have held a strike outside the glass company 
Cristar SAS (subsidiary of the US multinational Owens Illinois Inc. , which controls 85% 
of the company). There they are in tents, surrounded by posters that testify to the 
solidarity they have received from several unions in the department. 35 workers from the 
60 who initiated it have remained firm in this strike: desertions occurred only in the 
first few months, a sign of the will of these workers[1]. Since then this group of 35 
workers has remained unshakable claiming their rights. The class consciousness and the 
solidary sense of these workers is admirable.

The origin of this conflict starts from the conditions in which the workers of this 
factory worked - many for several decades - through the figure of cooperatives of 
associated work and companies subcontractors of facade. Of the 750 workers in the factory, 
only 120 were hired directly by the company, almost all administrative workers, area 
managers and engineers. Tired of the conditions of work in which they were violated all 
the rights, with a very low salary, without benefits and with hours of work well above the 
legal, while being aware of the measures against the associated work that were advanced in 
the Colombian legislature thanks to the debate provoked by the strike of the cane cutters 
in 2008, decided to unionize, forming the "Union of Available and Temporary Workers" 
(SINTRADIT). This is how on October 24, 2011, they present a list of requests to the 
company. This not only refused to negotiate and did not know the right to unionize 
workers, but since November 22 of the same year denied the entry of almost all members of 
the union to the company. Then the company hired most of the workers directly, to avoid 
penalties for bad practices: but according to the workers on strike, almost all these 
workers have been dismissed over time, with a very high turnover. The striking workers 
denounce a true apartheid against them, pointing out that if any of the factory workers 
comes to talk to them, they are immediately dismissed. present a list of requests to the 
company. This not only refused to negotiate and did not know the right to unionize 
workers, but since November 22 of the same year denied the entry of almost all members of 
the union to the company. Then the company hired most of the workers directly, to avoid 
penalties for bad practices: but according to the workers on strike, almost all these 
workers have been dismissed over time, with a very high turnover.

The striking workers denounce a true apartheid against them, pointing out that if any of 
the factory workers comes to talk to them, they are immediately dismissed. present a list 
of requests to the company. This not only refused to negotiate and did not know the right 
to unionize workers, but since November 22 of the same year denied the entry of almost all 
members of the union to the company. Then the company hired most of the workers directly, 
to avoid penalties for bad practices: but according to the workers on strike, almost all 
these workers have been dismissed over time, with a very high turnover. The striking 
workers denounce a true apartheid against them, pointing out that if any of the factory 
workers comes to talk to them, they are immediately dismissed. but since November 22 of 
the same year denied entry to almost all members of the union to the company. Then the 
company hired most of the workers directly, to avoid penalties for bad practices: but 
according to the workers on strike, almost all these workers have been dismissed over 
time, with a very high turnover. The striking workers denounce a true apartheid against 
them, pointing out that if any of the factory workers comes to talk to them, they are 
immediately dismissed. but since November 22 of the same year denied entry to almost all 
members of the union to the company. Then the company hired most of the workers directly, 
to avoid penalties for bad practices: but according to the workers on strike, almost all 
these workers have been dismissed over time, with a very high turnover. The striking 
workers denounce a true apartheid against them, pointing out that if any of the factory 
workers comes to talk to them, they are immediately dismissed. having a very high 
turnover. The striking workers denounce a true apartheid against them, pointing out that 
if any of the factory workers comes to talk to them, they are immediately dismissed. 
having a very high turnover. The striking workers denounce a true apartheid against them, 
pointing out that if any of the factory workers comes to talk to them, they are 
immediately dismissed.

The striking workers are not asking for anything extravagant. They are calling for three 
basic and constitutional requirements to be fulfilled: direct contracting, freedom of 
association and freedom to negotiate. Nothing more, but nothing less. All three doors to 
Colombian institutions, including labor courts and labor inspection, have been struck, 
asking for these three things, for which they have not received any response. That is why 
they have chosen to seek international bodies such as the ILO. They have been visited not 
only by multiple national and international trade union delegations, but also by human 
rights missions such as the Caravan of Jurists. All this has helped them to maintain morale,

Within the framework of actions in solidarity with this strike, a talk was organized on 
August 8 (day 2084 of the strike), in which we discussed what the peace process means for 
the workers of the afflicted Colombian industry, as well as for the precarious workers 
that today swarm, in the context of systematic destruction of the unions and the 
annihilation of its leaders that has been lived in the last 30 years. The guarantees that 
the people can make politics without fear of their physical integrity also include the 
respect to the unions, according to several assistants they expressed. As is well known, 
the systematic attacks on trade unionism in Colombia continue to make this country a true 
world record.

Today, that Colombia is witnessing an immense social explosivity, it is important that all 
struggles unite and seek basic points of convergence. A worker said to us, " we will 
continue here, my friend, so that we may have 2,000 more days, because our struggle is 
just. If we abandon it, we will fail all workers in this country ." Surrounding the 
workers of SINTRADIT and accompanying them in their titanic struggle is a duty for all 
those whose souls are wrinkled by so much injustice. They have not spent a day of this 
strike alone, but we need more, many more, to accompany them. If they do not abandon us, 
we do not abandon them.

José Antonio Gutiérrez D.
August 17, 2017

[1]On this strike, see also a previous article http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=182980

https://www.anarkismo.net/article/30516

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Message: 5






"To escape, they had requisitioned everything that could ride: motorbikes, tractor, dodgy 
cars, pick-up trucks and even a backhoe loader carrying some fighters in the shovel." ---- 
Alternative libertarian reproduces the blog posts Kurdistan-Autogestion-Revolution , a 
travel diary of a fellow committed to the YPG. ---- Over the course of the weeks, he will 
testify to the life of the fighting militias, the debates that take place there and the 
experience of democratic confederalism in the liberated areas. ---- Raqqa East Front, 
September 13, 2017 ---- Continued from my previous post. ---- The 1 st  of June, it was 
now three days since we entered Mansoura and that we hold the same defensive position near 
the main road leading to the city center. There were successive clashes between our troops 
and those of the Islamic state, but the fighting was not very intense, especially for my 
unit, which is neither a sniper unit, no deminers nor heavy weapons .

Since the middle of the day, a rumor ran through our ranks: the jihadists threw in the 
towel. As my Kurd improved, I realized that we had reached an agreement with the Islamic 
state. They were leaving the city, abandoning their heavy equipment and ammunition, and we 
were going to let them go to Raqqa.

This negotiation disturbed me at first ... but we are far from the western anti-terrorist 
mysticism ("  We do not negotiate with the terrorists !  ") And the fantasized image that 
we can have of the revolution ; we are in a situation of belligerence. I will return to 
this in the next post.

A pitiful caravan of jihadists

This was my reflection when, suddenly, a comrade landed in a whirlwind ordered me to hide 
in the building.

I quickly understood why. A few seconds later, in a cloud of dust, a long column of enemy 
vehicles made its appearance on the road we were heading towards Raqqa. Very special 
situation: while we were only 10 YPGs in this place, 150 to 200 soldiers of the Caliphate 
were passing within 100 meters of us. In other words, if something were to be true, we 
were dead.

But obviously, this pitiful caravan of jihadists retreating had no desire that it went 
wrong. To escape, they had requisitioned everything that could drive: motorcycles, 
tractor, dropped cars, pick-up and even a backhoe loader carrying some fighters in the 
shovel. This picturesque procession immediately reminded me of a story my grandmother 
liked to tell me: the difference between the German army proudly entering its city in 
1940, in perfect uniform uniform ranks, and the same fleeing army in 1944, carrying in her 
debacle all that she could carry away, apart from her dignity.

Similar sentiments must have seized the hearts of the inhabitants and inhabitants of 
Mansoura, whom I was soon to meet.

Arthur Aberlin

http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Un-communiste-libertaire-dans-les-YPG-14-Nous-avions-passe-un-accord-avec-l

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Message: 6






Over the last few days we've been given a couple of direct insights into the minds of our 
political elite, in particular in relation to how women are to be viewed in modern 
Ireland. On his daily talk show last Friday, rugby pundit, and right-wing mouth piece 
George Hook went on a three minute tirade, moralising about rape of a young woman in the 
UK. The outcome of his spiel: blaming a rape victim for being assaulted while unconscious. 
---- A key insight in the work German philosopher Karl Marx was on the role of ideology in 
shaping what we view as normal within a given social structure. As Marx went to great 
lengths to explain, it is not the ideology of everyone in the society that matters, it is 
the ideology of the ruling elite - the political class which he termed the bourgeoisie. 
What the rich and powerful deem to be "normal" in other words is what becomes normal and 
acceptable in our day to day culture.

What Hook said was "Why does a girl who just meets a fella in a bar go back to a hotel 
room? She's only just barely met him, she has no idea of his health conditions, she has no 
idea who he is, she has no idea of what dangers he might pose, but modern day social 
activity means that she goes back with him, then is SURPRISED when someone comes into the 
room and rapes her."

While acknowledging that the rape itself was wrong, a footnote in his meandering - Hook's 
message was trotting out of an argument which has been used to apologise for rapes and 
blame women for being raped, for years. His view is entirely coherent with the view of 
women under patriarchal-capitalism: women serve a unique purpose as sex objects for the 
gratification of men. It is their responsibility to be aware of this role, and they are 
ultimately responsible should they find themselves in a situation where a man decides to 
attack her. While men ideally should know better than to rape a person they cannot always 
be expected to meet such high expectations.

This view, while arguably more obscene in basic sense, coincides to some degree with the 
views on abortion recently articulated by our neo-liberal, narcissist in chief: Taoiseach 
Leo Varadkar in a New York Times article, modestly titled "Move Over DiCaprio and da Vinci 
- Here's Ireland's Leo". While being the leader of a state which forces all pregnant 
people to carry pregnancy through to full term in cases of rape, incest and foetal 
abnormality or face imprisonment for up to fourteen years, Varadkar made a couple of very 
ambiguous and politically savvy comments when asked about Ireland's archaic abortion laws.

"while I don't accept the view that the unborn child, the foetus, if you prefer that term, 
should have equal rights to an adult woman, to the mother, I don't share this view that 
the baby in the womb, the foetus, whatever term you want to use, should have no rights at 
all".

Varadkar here is attempting to give a "centrist" argument. So as not to be seen as extreme 
or ideological (maximising is appeal to the voter base) he is putting up strawman 
arguments so as not to address the real issues at hand, and to come off as having 
delivered so meaningful comment on the issue. He does not address the question as to 
whether the state, or any orgainsed "authority" should have the right to control a 
person's decision over their own body. While acknowledging some conflict of autonomous 
rights between a foetus and the person carrying it (something widely acknowledged by 
pro-choice activists) he does not go further to elaborate as to what point of pregnancy 
the rights of a foetus should supersede those of the person carrying it. While this sounds 
technical and abstract, it is all too real for those people in Ireland who for possessing 
a clump of cells within them, which bears no semblance to anything like a human, are 
criminalised, and vilified by the State for deciding not to proceed with a pregnancy. That 
in 2016 over three thousand people were forced to flee the jurisdiction of the Irish state 
to avail of a medical procedure providing them determination of the course of their own lives.

More broadly again, this view fits into that of patriarchal capitalism which holds that a 
primary purpose of people assigned the female sex, is to reproduce in order to create the 
next generation of masters and servants. This important duty must be ascribed to, and any 
individual's attempt to negate this responsibility through seeking to terminate a 
pregnancy calls into question the system in its entirety - and therefore should not be 
tolerated.

Those members of our political elite conveniently mange to ‘forget' the centuries of 
oppression forced on women through the very institutions from which they dictate to us. 
The ‘Laundries' established by the Irish State, and ran by the Catholic Church were bloody 
tools of women's oppression, an axe which forced women in Ireland to adhere to a certain 
view of what a woman is to be. To be seen as promiscuous, or a free thinking woman not 
very long ago in this country would be enough to have you enslaved in prisons, subjected 
to physical and psychological torture by "servants of the Lord".

The ideology of the bourgeoisie will permit each of us only as much freedom as we demand 
and take from them. It is due to decades and centuries of struggle, by people at the 
bottom of social hierarchy that Hook's comments have been met with a backlash and forced 
him to apologise on air. It is due to the hard work and activism of people like you and me 
that Varadkar with all his misogyny and outright classism can hold office as an openly gay 
man in this country. The struggle against the ideology of the State and ruling elite will 
continue - September 30th will be the sixth annual "March for Choice" in Dublin, a mass 
assembly of people demanding basic reproductive rights for all people in Ireland.

More details available here:  https://wsm.ie/c/march-choice-30sept .

https://www.wsm.ie/c/george-hook-women-patriarchal-capitalist-ireland

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