DURING A SUMMER BREAK IN THE SOUTH, FREEDOM GRABBED THE OPPORTUNITY TO INTERVIEW THE ANARCHIST COLLECTIVE ROUVIKONAS IN ATHENS ~ Blade Runner ~ The collective has built a reputation for direct actions that range from occupying ministries to smashing up the offices of debt collectors. Formed in 2014, in the wake of Greece’s anti-austerity struggles, they describe their work as bridging the gap between anarchists and the wider social base. In conversation, their style is as direct as their actions. On the collective’s beginnings: “Rouvikonas was founded in 2014. At that time, Greece had gone through social and political turmoil. Following the death of the young anarchist Alexis Grigoropoulos, an insurrection broke out in 2008 and a whole generation was radicalised. Then from 2010 to 2014, a big part of the social base took to the streets to fight against austerity measures, but the movement died out and the unrest was channelled back into parliamentary politics and the State. “The comrades who founded Rouvikonas thought that anarchists had lost a great and rare revolutionary opportunity in those years. They were not able to offer a credible alternative to the State for the people of the social base. So, they started reflecting on the mistakes and dead ends of the anarchist movement, and how to fix them. This is the context that triggered Rouvikonas’ creation: to bridge the gap that existed between anarchists and the social base.” On the use of social media: “Our political choice is to publicly claim responsibility for everything we do. Every action is followed by a statement with video and photo material, and a text explaining what we did and why. This serves several goals. By documenting our actions, we prevent the enemy from making false accusations. We can demonstrate exactly what we did, so it’s harder for a judge to condemn us on false charges. “At the same time, video footage is a powerful tool of communication: people can see with their own eyes what we did, and it can be inspiring. We show our actions to break the state of fear in which the social base is kept by the State and its propaganda mechanisms. The aim is to break paralysis and apathy, and to encourage people to join the struggle.” Intervention in a department store following reports for poor working conditions On state repression: “Patterns of repression have changed over the years, depending on the government. … Now there’s an open investigation trying to classify us as a criminal organisation, using changes in the penal code. This is serious — penalties are harsher, and it’s harder to avoid prison by paying fines. But we continue to fight.” “What really scares them is that we keep bringing in new people. In their own investigation they admit this: every time they identify members after an action, they see faces they didn’t know before. People without history in other groups or demonstrations, of all ages, genders, lifestyles. Not the usual suspects. Ordinary people who had never been political, joining Rouvikonas and taking action.” On firefighting and disaster relief: “Following decades of state cuts to the fire department, every year vast regions of Greece are destroyed by fires. People watch their houses burn, firefighters do what they can but with limited resources they cannot do much. When they protest, they get beaten by riot police. This is why three years ago we created a Volunteer Firefighters Sector for forest firefighting. “We now have three vehicles and a well-trained crew of volunteers. All summer they patrol the countryside and intervene when wildfires break out. In the last two years they saved people, houses, and wild animals. The logic is that of self-organisation: not to depend on the State, but to count on our own forces. As we say in Greece, ‘only the people can save the people’.” Rouvikonas’ firefighting volunteers in action On Antifascism: “Golden Dawn was defeated. It was defeated in the streets first, and then declared a criminal organisation and outlawed. By then it had already become useless to the ruling class. Militant antifascism is essential, but is not the whole story. There will always be small fascist groups, and you keep them in check in the streets. “But the real question is: how do we prevent them from gaining ground among the social base? The reason they gained influence was the political void we created. If you’re absent from social and political struggles, people turn elsewhere. If you don’t represent a credible alternative to parties and the State, people look elsewhere for solutions. We must be on the front line of the social and class war every day. To the degree we succeed, people will turn to us and ignore them.” Palestine solidarity walk in Athens’ touristic centre On Palestine solidarity: “Greece is a partner in genocide with Israel. The Greek bourgeoisie has historic and existential ties with the Israeli ruling class. Here we have companies collaborating with the Israeli military, and Israeli investors buying property and hotels. As long as such targets exist, there will be ways to hit the Zionist state and its genocidal policies.” The full interview will be featured in the next issue of Freedom anarchist journal The post Interview with Rouvikonas appeared first on Freedom News.

WELL-COORDINATED DIRECT ACTION CATCHES THE POLICE OFF GUARD, SHOWING THE POWER OF SECURE AND STRATEGIC ORGANISING ~ Kevin Blowe ~ On 9 September, at around 7.30 in the morning, an advance bloc of about 150 protesters, their faces covered, suddenly appeared by London City Hall in east London, near to where Britain’s largest arms fair, Defence and Security Equipment International (DSEi), was due to start at 9 o’clock. The protest bloc walked unchallenged to the entrance, where DSEi 2025 delegates were due to arrive, and blocked it. They then successfully held the space as police tried desperately to push them to one side, while more and more protesters began to arrive at the advertised 8am assembly time. Groups of senior officers stood in huddles trying to work out what to do, while the attempts of the ‘Police Liaison’ blue bib intelligence gatherers to engage with protesters were loudly rebuffed with cries of “free, free Palestine”. As delegates arrived, a few in military uniform but most in the industry’s favoured ‘casual suits and trainers’ combo, they were eventually diverted to another entrance, forced to run a narrow gauntlet behind a line of police officers as other groups of campaigners shouted “shame on you” and worse. The message was up close and unavoidable, and while some delegates were angrily dismissive, most looked embarrassed and deeply uncomfortable. It was magnificent. How was it possible that the Metropolitan Police so abjectly failed to see this coming, despite the leaflets and social media calling for campaigners to “Shut DSEi Down”? Clearly, the National Police Coordination Centre’s Strategic Intelligence and Briefing (SIB) team, who compile the intelligence for police forces on protests, thought this call to action was symbolic, rather than genuine. The last DSEI protests in 2023 had been quiet and in the absence of other information, they assumed it would remain so this year. However, SIB’s failure was fundamentally the result of decisions by protest organisers themselves. The ‘Big One’ Coalition had mobilised through trusted networks, sharing information internally based on an agreed plan of potential risks that, crucially, everyone had stuck to. At Netpol we have long argued that we can risk over-estimating how proficient the police really are at surveillance, when in fact they rely heavily on the information we carelessly share ourselves. That did not happen in advance of 9 September, and is a large part of why the police were caught by surprise. The DSEi protest was the clearest example, for some considerable time, of what is possible when groups start to take security seriously – and at one of the most heavily surveilled events in the country too. Later in the morning, the police turned to violence—as they often do when frustrated by protesters. At the alternate entrance for delegates, officers from the Territorial Support Group, the Met’s thuggish riot unit, along with officers from British Transport Police’s equivalent, the Operational Support Unit, were assembled and then rushed protesters, knocking people to the ground and then pointlessly kettling a small group. Photo: Netpol One older peace campaigner from Bristol was, fortunately, helped to his feet unharmed, but a young woman left the kettle in an ambulance with a broken ankle. Not long afterwards, another protester was knocked unconscious and also taken to hospital. An independent legal observer monitoring the policing of the protest also suffered a broken wrist. Remarkably, despite the disruption and this heightened level of police aggression, only three people were arrested all morning, all for self-evidently dubious “assault on an emergency worker” allegations. The protester taken to hospital was arrested just after he was discharged, but was later told the police would take no further action against him. We hope he is already talking to lawyers about suing the Met and we have released a call-out for witnesses for all the injuries. This is what also makes this year’s DSEi protest stand out: for showing it is possible to take powerful, decisive action against the arms industry without centring mass arrests as a core strategic aim. The contrast could not have been greater, then, with the Defend Our Juries protest against the banning of Palestine Action, which took place three days earlier in Parliament Square in central London. There, around 1,300 people, many of them pensioners, were deliberately anticipating a terrorism arrest for holding up signs in support of a proscribed group. The early pace of arrests was slow, with groups of officers first carrying out the wheelchair users and then sign holders at the edges of the crowded square. Onlookers’ disgust and anger at the sight of grandparents, nurses and teachers treated as ‘terrorists’ led to voices raised even louder. The police became more uneasy and aggressive as they were jostled and during several of these terrorism arrests, people were pushed over and batons were drawn by some officers. Photo: Defend Our Juries After 3pm, more demonstrators began to arrive from the Palestine Coalition’s National March for Gaza, having decided to skip the speeches in Whitehall to come and show their support. The crowd swelled, as did the tension. More and more officers were required for each arrest, as they were quickly mobbed by angry protesters, some of whom seemed ready and willing to help with de-arrests, if only that hadn’t been the exact opposite of what these particular detainees wanted. As well as almost 900 arrested under the Terrorism Act on 6 September, which continued late into the evening, there were also 17 other arrests, mostly for “assault on an emergency worker”. Just as at DSEi, these arrests were highly questionable. The following day, senior officers leaned heavily on the “intolerable abuse” that police had received, as if they deserved praise for enforcing an unjust law. Certainly, some officers in Parliament Square appeared as demoralised as some of the delegates at DSEi, but like the arms traders, that’s the choice they have made. The direct action of the Shut DSEi Down protesters and the civil disobedience of the sign holders represent two strands of the current movement against Israeli genocide in Gaza, alongside the regular marches through the capital (now the 30th organised since October 2023). Both, in different ways, are also trying to navigate the crackdown on the right to protest in Britain that Netpol described last year, even before Palestine Action was banned, as “state repression”. The action at DSEi left protesters exhilarated, but those in Parliament Square who believe the government might at last listen to the mass power of moral example may have felt disheartened. The question now is whether the time and energy needed to outwit police surveillance can be replicated, persuading allies to treat security as central to their organising. The post London arms fair disruption: A stark contrast to mass arrests for Palestine appeared first on Freedom News.

YESTERDAY’S DAY OF ACTION SAW BLOQUONS TOUT STEPPING OUT OF THE SHADOWS NATIONWIDE—AND FACING MAJOR POLICE REPRESSION ~ punkacademic ~ Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in France on Wednesday (10 September) as the first day of action organised under the banner Bloquons Tout (“Block Everything”) saw widespread protests and blockades in defence of jobs, pensions, and public services. By the evening, mainstream news outlets reported 812 individual actions across the country, along with 262 blockades. The police had deployed 80,000 police officers and gendarmes, making over 500 arrests by late afternoon. Government sources had been briefing that only 100 thousand protestors could be expected to turn out, but the Interior Ministry conceded that the numbers on the streets had been at least double that. The CGT said that a quarter of a million people had mobilised in the course of the day, while anti-capitalist website Contre Attaque reported up to 360 thousand protesters. https://contre-attaque.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/signal-2025-09-10-125917.mp4 Several universities closed in anticipation of potential occupations, and local authorities across the country pre-emptively ordered shops and businesses to close—effectively surrendering before action began. In Paris, a major demonstration took place at the Place de la Republique, and at Les Halles the shopping complex was blocked off to prevent access. Another demonstration against the government’s foreign policy and in support of Palestinian freedom took place at the Gare du Nord, where a thousand protestors attempted to enter the station. Activists also attempted to blockade the Paris ring road, but these actions were only briefly successful, as police on motorbikes dismounted and brutally pursued the protestors. Paris, Place des Fêtes Outside of Paris, blockades had greater success. Huge crowds marched in Marseille and Rennes, where a bus was torched and major roads effectively blocked. In the northern town of Laon, the Anarchist Federation was involved in actions alongside feminist comrades, opening a free thrift store which was attacked by police. One comrade described scenes of ‘almost unprecedented violence‘. With Macron’s most recent Prime Minister, Francois Bayrou, toppled by the National Assembly days before the mobilisation, tensions were heightened by the President’s choice of conservative defence minister Sebastien Lecornu as a replacement. Many protestors cited Bayrou’s budget cuts as a motivator, with Lecornu’s appointment seen as clear evidence that the oligarchical politics of Macronism would never change. Supermarket action, Perpignan The mainstream media has characterised Bloquons Tout as far left extremists and implying far-right involvement. There has been a persistent sneer at the idea of a ‘leaderless’ movement, betraying the anxiety caused to social and political elites. While the unions have only called a major day of action on 18 September, strikes already took place yesterday at hospitals bearing the brunt of cuts, building the momentum towards a continued wave of disruption. The post France blockades: The leaderless escalate appeared first on Freedom News.

ARRESTS OUTSIDE PARLIAMENT RISK CENTRING LIBERAL FREEDOMS INSTEAD OF PALESTINIAN SURVIVAL ~ Kell w Farshéa ~ Its 9pm, last Saturday (6 September). I’m standing on the pavement in the dark, watching the arrests. Police vans queue down the side of Parliament Square, engines idling. Police in high-vis jackets wade through the crowd of chanting singing people. Every five minutes cops emerge from the crowd carrying someone pron,e whilst another cop walks alongside telling them that they are being arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000. A group of supporters chanting “we are the revolution” accompany a man walking to the police van. Others shout “shame, shame” or “are you proud of yourself”. On and on it goes. Yet how English and polite and obedient it is. People are quietly carried to the vans where they climb inside unaided. I see people chat to the police officers as if we are all on the same side—decency, civility, democratic values, common outrage. The hours pass, more people are driven off through the police road block to the police cells. Its relentless. Google tells me that in August 2025 there were only 900 cells available in UK men’s prisons. Yet almost 1,500 people have been charged for explicitly stating they support Palestine Action. Indeed the internet suggests many people charged will face a fine rather than imprisonment. The Prime Minister and his new Home Secretary look like paper tigers, not resolute law makers. 1,500 people showing they are not afraid of the consequences in breaking one of the more serious crimes on statute because the law is seen as morally bankrupt. There is something powerful in this spectacle of defiance played out in front of parliament at night. And yet If passive resistance is so powerful, if the prison and police cells are in such short supply—why have the mass protests against genocide not brought 100,000 marchers to sit down in the streets of London? Indeed why was it only when UK citizen’s rights were threatened that people were prepared to be arrested en masse? I am absolutely sure that members of Palestine Action still want the focus to be on Gaza, but it seems like white liberalism is now more focussed instead on the proscription itself. And beyond the sight of elderly pensioners bedecked in military medals being arrested—how effective is this protest at stopping the genocide and ending the occupation? How much has the proscription taken the focus off the millions being starved to death in Gaza? Perhaps in the face of almost two years of mass demonstrations, emails and petitions it is understandable that people grasp for some kind of meaningful protest. Yet in an age when Parliament is uninterested in moral, genocidal, ecocidal or democratic principles, this may no longer be relevant. And yet, the questions must be asked. How can we more effectively resist the actual genocide? How can we avoid centring the debate over liberal democratic ideas and conditional freedoms, and instead re-centre it on the colonial capitalist murder of the people of Palestine? Let us remember that Mr. Starmer is not sympathetic to principled ‘gesture’ arrests. He is on record saying XR actionists should get long sentences. Starmer endorses segregationist policies for trans people and leans into Farage and the EDL’s fascist language on immigration. He would leave every pensioner in London on bail and still not allow PA to return. The mass arrests on Saturday were magnificent, cinematic even. But lets not pretend it’s not a sideshow distracting from the real issue—ending the genocide and fighting for a Free Palestine. Not one Palestinian child’s life will be saved by any of these arrests unless they refocus on the key issue: that while the government mouths platitudes about the man-made famine, it provides logistical support for drone attacks on children and targeted assassinations of journalists. > — “C’est magnifique, mais ce n’est pas la guerre” (French General Pierre > Bosquet on the charge of the British Light Brigade at Balaclava, 25 October > 1854) > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Photos: Peter Marshall The post Proscription Action: It’s magnificent, but it’s not war appeared first on Freedom News.

WHILE ISRAEL BRANDS IT AS ‘TERRORISM’, GENOA DOCKWORKERS THREATEN MASS ACTION SHOULD THE FLOTILLA BE INTERCEPTED ~ Santiago Navarro F, Avispa Midia ~ As the Sumud Flotilla sails through the Mediterranean, Israel’s stance has been swift, threatening to label its crew, from more than 44 countries, as terrorists and to arrest and imprison them. Following these threats, Italian dockworkers in the port of Genoa have warned that if they lose contact with the flotilla for even 20 minutes, they will block the departure of 14,000 containers of merchandise to Israel. The flotilla of over 50 boats set sail on Sunday (30 August) from Barcelona, carrying trade unionists, doctors, parliamentarians, and activists such as American actress Susan Sarandon and Portuguese actress Sofía Aparicio, as well as Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, who was detained and deported last June while attempting to break the Gaza blockade with the then-called Freedom Flotilla. Their objective is threefold: to deliver aid directly, to break the media and political isolation of Gaza, and to denounce to the world what they describe as a “genocidal war” and an “illegal siege”. Since October 2023, Israel has killed more than 62,000 Palestinians and injured more than 157,000. Meanwhile, it continues to systematically obstruct the entry of food and humanitarian aid into the enclave. “It’s unfortunate that we have to do it ourselves; that we have to load ships with humanitarian aid to try to break the blockade and stop the genocide”, said Saif Abukeshek, a spokesperson for the flotilla, who was detained by Egypt last June during the Global March for Gaza. “We’re not just announcing the mission itself, but the building of a global solidarity movement that works with all oppressed peoples”, he explained. Abukeshek speaking in Barcelona. Photos: Albert Hernández Israeli national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir warned that activists travelling aboard the flotilla will be subjected to prolonged detention and will be denied privileges. “We will not allow people who support terrorism to live in comfort. They will face the full consequences of their actions”, Ben-Gvir said. Responding from Genoa, Riccardo Rudino, representative of the Autonomous Committee of Stevedores (CALP), issued an ultimatum in a video warning that if contact with the fleet is lost for even 20 minutes, “we will block Europe”. He also emphatically stated that “not a single nail will come out. We will go on an international strike, block roads, and block schools”. In Genoa alone, more than 300 tons of humanitarian aid were collected prior to the flotilla’s departure. This cargo was sent to the port of Catania and distributed to Italian ships that will join the humanitarian voyage. The voyage is planned to last seven to eight days. Strict security and discretion measures have been implemented, mindful of previous experiences with Israeli repression. This year has already seen two bitter precedents: the Madleen, with Thunberg on board, and the Handala, which were intercepted in June and July respectively by drone attacks and boarded by Israeli commandos in international waters. Their passengers were beaten, kidnapped, deported, and had their phones confiscated. Despite the drone overflights of the vessels near the coasts of Mallorca and Menorca, which the Flotilla has reported, they continue on their way to Gaza. The vessels advance each day toward their destination, with actions in different countries taking place at all times, ranging from words of encouragement to the addition of more vessels and people. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Edited machine translation The post Sumud flotilla heads to Gaza “to break the blockade and stop the genocide” appeared first on Freedom News.

HUNDREDS ARRESTED IN A MASS KETTLE OF MARCH CLOSING ACTION CAMP AGAINST THE ARMS INDUSTRY ~ Gabriel Fonten ~ Police in Cologne, Germany used heavy handed tactics on Saturday (30 August) against a peaceful mass march concluding an anti-militarist camp in the city. The 3,000-strong parade had set out from the “Rheinmetall Entwaffen” antimilitarist camp to meet the yearly rally of the Cologne Peace Forum. One participant described the event as “a historic moment when the few hundred, mostly older participants of this rally watched hundreds, mostly younger people from the camp, who had travelled from both near and far”. Yet the march was not allowed to continue uninterrupted, as marchers were set upon by around 1,600 police in full riot gear, backed by water cannons and armed with pepper spray. The demonstrators quickly reconfigured into a protective block formation (using banners to separate and protect participants from police) taking “3 hours to move one kilometre” under consistent harassment by the police. After dividing and kettling the parade, around 600 participants were arrested over the next five hours. Medical non-profit “Demosanitäter” reported treating 147 injured participants and at least 216 were treated at the “Rheinmetall Entwaffen” camp. Justifications for this brutal crackdown were manufactured by both the police and the establishment media, with the Tageschau news program running headlines including “Riots at anti-war demonstration in Cologne”—presenting protesters, rather than the police, as the instigators of violence. In fact, of the 600 people arrested only one was charged with “resisting arrest”. Cologne police had previously prohibited both the camp and parade citing risks of “radicalisation”, but this was overturned in court. While it stood, the ban seems to have only increased participation with organisers reporting growing mobilisation as well as the creation of an “anarchist neighbourhood” at the camp. The post Germany: Heavy repression at Rhinemetall anti-militarist demonstration appeared first on Freedom News.

THINGS COULD BE, SHOULD BE, AND MUST BE BETTER—BUT WHAT KIND OF POWER DO WE WANT? ~ Dave, member of Haringey Solidarity Group ~ Power over people, or empowered people everywhere controlling their own lives? Is the top-down way our society is currently organised and run the natural “way things are”, and the only way? Do we have to put up with a system based on money, profits and greed, and on hierarchies, politicians and power structures? No! Why should we accept what inevitably comes with such a society – institutional injustice, exploitation, unfairness and discrimination, not to mention poverty, wars and environmental destruction? Things could be, should be, and must be better than that. But in what way? And how do we get from here to there? Firstly, whilst those with wealth and power, such as transnational corporations and governments, are relentlessly and ruthlessly working hard to maintain their domination of our world for their own profits and power, billions of people are acting in a different way in our everyday lives. REAL NORMAL BEHAVIOUR Families share resources and encourage the real human values of cooperation: mutual aid and respect. In every workplace workers try to do the same. In every neighbourhood and community, there are countless examples of such daily common sense, communication and solidarity. This is, in fact, the real “natural way” things should be done and how our whole society should be run. On top of such daily sensible, human connections everywhere, people are continuously making collective efforts at the grassroots to organise themselves, to share and spread skills, to articulate their views, to promote their common interests, to defend their rights, and to challenge things that are wrong. ORGANISING OURSELVES This is done through a plethora of groups, initiatives, projects and associations of all kinds (it is estimated there are a million voluntary associations in the UK alone) – from bee-keeping societies, to robot-wars conventions, sports clubs to choirs, from childcare sharing arrangements to evening classes, and from park user groups and residents’ associations to trade union branches. Many of these are strengthened through their efforts to build supportive networks and federations. Many, possibly most, of these groups will employ democratic principles (for example everyone being equal), be based around volunteering and sharing, and encourage collective initiative. In my own area alone, Haringey in North London, there’s a network of more than 100 residents’ associations, a Friends of Parks Forum with 65 independent local groups, an organised network of 35 community-run community centres, a forum for all the allotment site committees, and a range of other self-organised, horizontal grassroots networks. What this proves beyond doubt is that “ordinary” people are in fact extraordinary, and we are very capable of organising and empowering ourselves. This human way of doing things could be a real alternative to capitalism and governments if people realised that politics is not about voting for politicians but about what we can do ourselves, for each other and the common good. It’s our world – let’s take it back! We need to up our game, organise ourselves and take action together to build community counter-power in every street and workplace. At the same time activists need to build strong local solidarity groups in every town across the UK and beyond, to support our communities, local campaigns, and to spread anti-authoritarian ideas. PEOPLE POWER There is an amazing history of grassroots people power movements, strike waves and social revolutions throughout the world which should inspire us. Such movements should not only be against what’s wrong but also be for what is right – where people aspire to seize control of their own lives, communities and workplaces and run them directly and collectively together for the benefit of all. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This article first appeared in the Summer 2025 issue of Freedom Journal The post Today’s seeds are tomorrow’s future appeared first on Freedom News.

FOSSIL FUEL INVESTORS UTILITIES SABOTAGED AND PALANTIR RECRUITMENT EVENT DISRUPTED IN ACTIONS LINKING CLIMATE CRISIS AND GAZA GENOCIDE ~ Alisa-Ece Tohumcu ~ Two militant climate action groups staged separate but thematically linked actions in London on Monday (18 August)—underscoring the growing urgency of confronting the institutions driving ecological collapse, militarism, and social injustice. In London, the underground network Shut The System claimed responsibility for sabotaging utilities at the offices of major fossil fuel investors, declaring the launch of a “Summer of Sabotage”. The coordinated action cut electrical and communications infrastructure at the UK offices of JP Morgan Chase, Allianz, and Barclaycard, with activists using cable-cutting and glue to disable service cabinets and masts. The group accused the firms of underwriting not only climate breakdown but also war crimes, highlighting Barclays’ and Allianz’s links to fossil fuels and, in Allianz’s case, its insurance of Elbit Systems, a key arms supplier to Israel. A spokesperson likened financiers’ complicity in fossil fuel expansion to wartime collaboration, calling it “unhinged, psychopathic greed at the expense of billions of people”. The group, which previously vandalised Barclays properties and disabled fibre optic cables at insurance offices earlier this year, promised escalation if their demands go unmet by October. Their manifesto, drawn from the Banking on Climate Chaos 2025 report, demands an immediate halt to fossil fuel expansion financing, absolute emissions reduction targets, robust transition plans, and the protection of Indigenous rights. Meanwhile, Climate Resistance disrupted a Palantir-run training camp for 16- to 18-year-old students. Chanting outside the venue, demonstrators condemned the attempt to “groom” young people for careers at a firm, whose technology supports surveillance states and the Israeli military. Palantir, which builds AI-driven data analytics platforms, has lucrative contracts with governments and militaries worldwide, including a £330 million data deal with NHS England. Although the company is opaque about its work with Israel, activists point to Palantir’s Gotham platform, described as part of the AI-assisted “kill chain” used to determine targets in Gaza. CEO Alex Karp has previously admitted the company’s software has been used to kill Palestinians, a claim framed by him as targeting “mostly terrorists”. “Students shouldn’t be groomed by companies like this,” said Climate Resistance spokesperson Sam Simons. “Palantir is enabling an ongoing genocide and helping authoritarian governments track every move of their citizens”. Neither Palantir nor the targeted financial institutions have issued public statements regarding Monday’s disruptions. The post Direct action targets UK military tech and fossil finance appeared first on Freedom News.

DESPITE POLICE BAN, PREPARATIONS CONTINUE FOR RHEINMETALL PROTEST CAMP IN COLOGNE AT THE END OF AUGUST ~ Cristina Sykes ~ The camp, running between 26-31 August, combines workshops, discussions and cultural events with protests targeting arms companies across the Rhein-Ruhr region. The Rheinmetall Entwaffnen (“Disarm Rheinmetall”) alliance, formed in 2018, is organising the week-long gathering to oppose Germany’s leading arms manufacturer and the wider militarisation drive. Cologne police prohibited both the camp and a planned “parade” to the nearby Konrad-Adenauer barracks, citing risks of “radicalisation”. A court upheld the ban on 15 August, even pointing to the century-old anti-war slogan Krieg dem Krieg (“war on war”) as supposed evidence of violent intent. Organisers reject the reasoning as political repression. “The camp will take place – we are very optimistic,” said Mila, a spokesperson for the alliance. “We will resist the ban legally and politically. The authorities may want to silence the anti-militarist movement, but we will go ahead”. The camp is expected to draw hundreds of participants from Germany and abroad, including anarchist collectives, feminist groups, anti-fascists and internationalist networks. A dedicated anarchist barrio has been announced, with organisers reporting growing mobilisation since the ban was declared. Workshops will cover topics such as the reintroduction of conscription, weapons exports, the impact of militarisation on women, and new technologies like AI in warfare. International guests are also invited to share their struggles. “We want to build a global network against war and militarisation”, said Mila. “People come to share experiences so we can act together”. The German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, home to Rheinmetall’s Düsseldorf headquarters, has become a focal point for opposition to the arms industry. Facilities in Cologne-Mülheim, Neuss and Weeze are all linked to the production of tanks, artillery and fighter jets. In recent days, activists marked a Siemens site in Munich with graffiti and banners denouncing its role in Bundeswehr automation. Another alliance, Rheinmetall Enteignen, has called for a demonstration outside Rheinmetall CEO Armin Papperger’s villa near Düsseldorf. The Clown Army is also mobilising While police and media point to clashes at past camps, organisers maintain that repression itself fuels confrontation. Die Linke MP Lea Reisner also criticised the Cologne ban as “a massive and unacceptable encroachment on the constitutional right of assembly”. For the organisers, the outcome is clear. “We will make the camp happen, with or without permission”, Mila said. “The repression only shows why our struggle against militarisation is necessary”. The post Germany: Anti-militarist camp to go ahead “with or without permission” appeared first on Freedom News.

FROM LA STREETS TO SALVADORIAN PRISONS, THE US ESCALATES ITS WAR ON MIGRANTS ~ Josie Ó Súileabháin ~ On the streets of Los Angeles, California earlier this summer, several masked and armed men attempted to kidnap a street vendor in broad daylight. Despite the gang showing no identification to authority, the community knew who they were. Luis Hipolito arrived on 9th street and witnessed the attempted kidnapping. He pulled out his phone and hit record. The armed men ordered him to leave but Luis refused and continued to film. The community began to gather, as they do across the country to resist this fascist repression and support each other in standing up to violence and authority. Andrea Guadalupe Velez arrived with her 17-year-old sister. Her mother Margarita was dropping them both off. Andrea got out the car and immediately saw a man running directly towards her. “He thinks I am illegal”, Andrea thought to herself bracing for impact, “because of the color of my skin”. Holding her hands up, the man collided into her. Luis was then pepper sprayed by the masked men, later identified as agents from Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Department for Homeland Security (DHS). Now blinded, Luis attempts to steady himself with his arms. Federal agents threw him down to the curb and assaulted Luis until his body goes into convulsions. Both Andrea and Luis have been charged with assaulting a police officer, released on bonds between $5000 and $10,000. In the view of the Department Homeland Security (DHS) assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin, the act of Luis filming the original abduction “kept ICE law enforcement from arresting the target illegal alien of their operation”. In other words, he was blamed for his own illegitimate arrest – based on his right to record an arrest. Over the next two weeks, 1,618 people were deported from Los Angeles and the surrounding area at a rate of around 95 a day. SUSPICIOUS BEHAVIOUR ICE raids have been observed to feature heavily armed and aggressive officers—masked and wearing tactical gear—arresting people at their place of work or on the streets. “A systematic pattern”, according to an ACLU lawsuit, where “individuals with brown skin are approached or pulled aside by unidentified Federal agents, suddenly and with a show of force, and made to answer questions about who they are and where they are from”. At an immigration court in San Francisco, ten masked and armed Federal agents violently forced their way through a blockade of demonstrators to abduct a male detainee following his court hearing. One officer brandished a rifle and pointed it at both protesters and the press, as other agents from ICE used pepper spray and violently pushed people to the ground. After resistance from the crowd, agents threw the man into the back of a black unmarked SUV. As ICE agents speed through the crowd of protesters, a woman was thrown off the hood of the car and onto the streets. ICE agents and protesters clashing outside the San Francisco immigration courthouse at 100 Mongtomery St. on July 8, 2025. Photo by Frankie Solinsky Duryea/ Mission Local The community gathers at the immigration court on 100 Montgomery street every Tuesday to resist the multiple abductions by Federal agents to the nearby ICE field office. This tactic of waiting outside the courtroom and taking people had escalated from simply arresting those who had come to ICE voluntarily. On 5 June, 15 people were arrested at the ICE field office on Sansome street including at least four children, one of them as young as three years old. As repression escalated, protesters took to the streets and courtrooms as a response to the abduction of thousands of members of their community, detained without charge and separated from their families. Despite this systematic targeting of the migrant community however, few migrants rights organisations support the rights of sex workers and are suspiciously silent when it comes to their arrest, detention and deportation. “Police cars, plainclothes cars, we all hide when (we) see them”, a migrant massage worker told Red Canary Song, a NY-based collective of Asian and Migrant sex workers. “We’ll be arrested as soon as we go out”. Respectability politics is to blame, organisers have pointed out, as groups attempt to sanitise their message and divide those who are deserving of solidarity and those whose rights are disposable. This is not something new and ironically by excluding sex workers from the struggle for migrant rights, we suppress a collective memory of resistance. Between January and February there were nearly 1,000 arrests in Queens, New York that directly targeted immigrant sex workers. Police raids have focused on massage parlours, arresting women and creating a climate of fear across these under-represented workers. “I’m scared to go to work”, the migrant massage worker reported anonymously. Authorities have justified a number of repressive police and immigration tactics in the past, using surveillance, racial profiling, raids, detentions and deportations as anti-trafficking measures. Law enforcement have claimed these measures are designed to protect women and children, yet in reality only expose migrants to more systematic violence. DHS has now begun using artificial intelligence to profile those walking on the streets, using flawed patterns over evidence for “suspicious behaviour”. These patterns includes factors like “foreign accent” or “short skirt” as part of it’s evaluation of sex work through live-streaming public cameras. Palantir currently has a $30 million contract to build a “master database” of all of those targeted by ICE, and various government agencies have received their pay for the building of this architecture of hate. As these technologies are applied to the general population, including facial recognition, we will see as with all surveillance, the only purpose is to build cases for prosecution and deportation. Photograph taken by the El Salvadorian government press department at the Centro De Confinamento Del Terrorismo (CECOT) prison system, after the U.S. deportation of 261 men on March 16th 2025. MONSTER OR TERRORIST? Agustín was sixteen-years-old when a group of armed men came to take him away but this was not the first time he had faced organised violence. When he was younger, local gangs had attempted to recruit Agustín. When he refused they threatened to kill his mother. Together, they fled to San José Guayabal to start a new life. For the second time, there was a knock on the door. Agustín was taken from his home by the El Salvadorian army and driven to a deserted road. He was ordered out of the truck and the soldiers simulated Agustín’s execution, making him believe he would die on his knees facing the barrel of a gun. This mock execution of the teenager was followed by his detention in an overcrowded cell with 70 other children. Agustín was kicked virtually every day by the other detainees in front of the guards who did nothing but watch. Detainees would count up to thirteen while assaulting him, in reference to MS-13. There are now 3,000 children within the sprawling Centro De Confinamento Del Terrorismo (CECOT) prison system, as reported by Human Rights Watch in 2022 El Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele has been in power since 2019 and for the last six years has radically eroded rights and freedoms through a repressive “war on gangs” that seeks to enrich the security sector at the expense of local communities. 40,000 people are now held within this prison system and an estimated 375 detainees have died in custody – all justified through a state of emergency or Bukele’s “state of exception”. In exchange for 261 men deported from the United States, El Salvador received $6 million to humiliate and warehouse them in this public theatre of dystopia. The men were escorted off three planes and taken through lines of heavily armoured and armed police officers. New inmates have their heads shaven upon arrival. Eighty men share a single cell. Most of those detained have no criminal record, inside or outside the United States. Yet they were convicted on the basis of administrative violence through intentional error and faulty symbolic criteria that categorised detainees as “monster”, “terrorist” or “gang member”. A point system that determines if tattoos, graffiti, hand signs or social media posts are ‘evidence’ of association to gangs. Most of those detained by ICE and DHS are taken to facilities within the United States. In Florida’s Everglades, a prison camp with the projected capacity for 5,000 people has been set up at the cost of $450 million. Testimonies reveal the typical state of the U.S. prison industrial complex. “They only brought a meal once a day and it had maggots”, Leamsy La Figura, a detainee at the prison said. “They never turned off the lights for 24 hours… we’re like rats in an experiment… I don’t know their motive for doing this, if it’s a form of torture. A lot of us have our residency documents and we don’t understand why we’re here”. MEMORY OF RESISTANCE “In terms of ICE detention”, Panagioti Tsolkas says in conversation with Max Granger, “we know the goal isn’t to remove every undocumented person; it’s to create a climate of fear and terror, to make people controllable, more scared to speak up or act in their own interests”. Tsolkas recommends looking into our collective memory and the political activism against ICE during Obama’s administration. In a documentary called The Infiltrators, young undocumented activists “intentionally got themselves arrested with the goal of organizing in prison centers”. By getting inside the prisons, the activists were able to document who was inside, taking down their names for their families to organise solidarity on the outside. A demonstrator marches with the community in the attempt of intercepting and preventing Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids in Chicago, June 10th 2025 “No-one dies but those who are forgotten”, Peter Gelderloos recalls an assertion from an armed group in the Chilean state who had taken over a street outside of a prison to show their solidarity. “In other words”, Gelderloos writes, “we all exist through our relations”. We resist through a collective memory of resistance. “When I was a boy”, the late anarchist Willem Van Spronsen once wrote, “in post-war Holland, later France, my head was filled with stories of the rise of fascism in the ’30s, I promised myself that I would not be one of those who stands by as neighbours are torn from their homes and imprisoned for somehow being perceived as lesser”. Willem was killed by police while taking direct action to sabotage a fleet of buses that served Northwest immigrant detention centre in Washington on July 13, 2019. His action in attempting to burn the buses coincided with the one year anniversary of a hunger strike from those detained inside, as well as over a decade of resistance from the community and La Resistencia, a grassroots organisation for undocumented migrants. “Anyone who is determined to carry out his or her deed is not a courageous person”, wrote Alfredo Bonanno. “They are simply a person who has clarified their ideas, who has realised that it is pointless to make such an effort to play the part assigned to them by capital in the performance… in doing so they realize themselves as human beings… the reign of death disappears before their eyes”. “You don’t have to burn the motherfucker down”, Willem wrote before his death, “but are you going to just stand by”? The post US: Community resistance to forced disappearances appeared first on Freedom News.