from the USA the kit for rebellious students –

Francesca Musacchio

08 maggio 2024

Protest tactics and tactics to stay safe by avoiding arrest and more. The galaxy of pro-Palestine protests in American universities has made a qualitative leap, also reaching Europe and Italy. From the positions to be held during protests to the identification of targets, the Palestine Action US manuals are now the “recommended” text for those who organize protests in universities. How to create physical barriers or “stacks”, i.e. lines of people who keep each other and advance towards a specific objective. Or, more simply, how to make it difficult to be grabbed or arrested by the police. After the “success” of “Inondare i gatelli: escalation”, also accepted in Italy by the anarchist world for example (even if with distances on the concept of leadership), the organization which defines itself as “a network of direct action for the dismantling of Zionism and US imperialism”, disseminates on social media a sort of manual for guerrilla warfare during demonstrations, evictions, various clashes or other situations that might arise when facing the police.

The pro-Palestine protests in American colleges and European universities, therefore, have transformed from demonstrations in favor of Gaza and the end of the conflict into actions once morest the Zionist enemy, who must be eradicated. No request for peace, only the boycott of Israel and all those who, in various capacities, support it or have relations with it. And if the doubt of an external direction within the pro-Palestine movements had already crept in in recent weeks, now some more elements emerge in favor of this thesis. For example, on the presence of infiltrators among the ranks of students, in the USA as in Italy, Palestine Action US is quite clear regarding it. In a paragraph of the manual entitled «Opening the doors of the university», organizers of campus occupations are invited to «open campuses to the community and refuse the distinction between students and external agitators. The popular movement for Palestine is currently based in universities, but students are not the only leaders, and non-students possess a reservoir of knowledge and experience to expand the struggle beyond campuses. We must create our ‘popular cradles’ of resistance! Doors open, therefore, to those with experience in riots.

In the case of Italy, the presence of anarchists and antagonists in pro-Palestine demonstrations, even outside universities, has already emerged. And it is precisely the anarchists, through their area sites, who disseminate the material of the organization, founded in 2020 in Great Britain and which has carried out numerous actions once morest Elbit, the Israeli company active in the development of technologies for the defense sector . «We receive the Italian translation of this short but dense contribution written by Palestine Action US – the anarchists write -. This is a truly remarkable text, for the order of the problems, for the clarity in posing them and for the radical nature of the consequences to be drawn from them. It seems to come from another historical era, suspended between the past and the future, confirming the power of what is happening inside and outside US campuses. Certainly not everything can be shared (for example the concept of leadership), but it is a very valuable stimulus to spread. The siege of Gaza is a preview of what the ruling class has planned for all the oppressed if we do not resist.” A common global network, therefore, which, starting from what is happening in Gaza, unites in the name of anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism.