Pedantic Welsh | Free 🇵🇸 | Future pupil barrister (Oct ‘25) | Activity integrated into history, in the time of abolitions…and capital shall have no dominion |
“Don’t come back to Peckham!” A walk of shame for police and immigration enforcement officers, leaving the estate after releasing the person they detained. Community solidarity works.
This van is going nowhere! Communities resist immigration raids. More people still needed to make sure the detained person is released: Evan Cook Close, Queen's Road Peckham SE15 2HL.
One of my legal heroes.
Fled Nazi Germany with his parents (his father is the Franz Neumann of Behemoth: The Structure and Practice of National Socialism), founder of an anarchist street gang, and attorney of the homeless.
Read more about him here: .
horrible scenes in dublin - the culmination of a campaign of far-right harassment and violence, with gardaí complicity.
solidarity with asylum seekers and anti-fascists.
Solidarity with everyone protesting inside Harmondsworth.
Conditions in detention are critical right now - racist abuse and use of force by staff is rife, healthcare and safeguarding is non-existent, and so many are left in the dark about their cases.
BREAKING: Detainees at Harmondsworth immigration removal centre in the west of London have occupied a courtyard at the centre, one of the largest in Europe, citing a "human rights crisis".
Claim they're being denied access to healthcare, particularly for mental health.
today in kent - manston detention camp. children behind barbed wire and layers of fences shouting “freedom” and “we need your help”. thousands - men, women, families - sleeping in overcrowded tents w/o access to legal support or adequate healthcare. the barbarism of the state.
Dozens of young children are being held at Manston detention camp in Kent.
Mothers, fathers, children and babies from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere.
We went today and heard them chanting for their freedom.
This is persecution. FREE THEM AND CLOSE IT DOWN.
there's a wonderful new website celebrating the life and work of
@IRR_News
's a sivanandan, including a comprehensive archive of his writings. check it out - .
#irr50
Three comrades go on trial tomorrow for taking direct action to prevent a racist charter flight.
They should be praised, not punished.
Because deportations destroy lives, tear families apart, and instil fear in our communities.
RALLY: three people are going on trial for blockading Brook House to stop a Jamaica deportation flight in November 2021.
Hear from SDS,
@lgsmigrants
,
@JCWI_UK
, defendants, & family members of those meant to be on the flight.
🕘 Tues 30 May, 9am.
📍 Lewes Crown Court, BN7 1YB.
american and british ministers in the 60s discussing the lie that the chagos islands are a land without a people (quoted in luke williams and natasha soobramanien’s brilliant novel diego garcia): “we must maintain that fiction”.
While politicians like Starmer issue their pro forma statements about a two-state solution and international law, villages in the West Bank are being ethnically cleansed by marauding, fanatical settlers.
A Nakba unfolding, in different intensities and scales, across Palestine.
‘Zanuta’s 150 residents have made a collective decision to leave. Armed settlers have begun breaking into their homes at night, beating up adults, destroying and stealing belongings, and terrifying the children’
“Journalist” (read: glorified police informant)
@maxparry4
infilitrates and grasses on a Palestine solidarity group, thereby doing his bit to ensure the continuation of a genocide involving the killing of an unprecedented number of real journalists.
“Don’t come back to Peckham!” A walk of shame for police and immigration enforcement officers, leaving the estate after releasing the person they detained. Community solidarity works.
go and watch
@BenLayPlay
by
@MarcusRediker
and naomi wallace at
@finborough
!
@markpovinelli
resurrects the revolutionary abolitionist spirit of benjamin lay.
“Let us build paradise, without the blood of war and commerce on our hands!”
other examples: in 2019 a trade unionist was wrongly prosecuted for allegedly assaulting police officers by...speaking through a megaphone. & in cardiff more recently a man said he was dragged out of his bed by police and arrested for...shining a torch too brightly at an officer.
This is an old story but worth bearing in mind: "Injuries" reported by the police included six insect bites, one officer "stung on finger by possible wasp", three toothaches (!), three officers with heat exhaustion and several with headaches.
@KonstantinKisin
@novaramedia
Where anyone has broken the law they should be arrested. And that’s absolutely the case on the protest, of course. Use of fireworks was moronic and those people should obviously be arrested - as one example.
Good introduction to the often dystopian Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system, which enables corporations to sue states that try to expel or rein them in. Recommend
@kennardmatt
and
@ClaireProvost
's recent book Silent Coup, which investigates the ISDS system in detail.
Kay Burley: "Whats the view on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza this morning?"
The Israeli ambassador to the UK: "There is no humanitarian crisis..."
"There isn't?"
"There isn't"
i’ve gone in the sea around gower at night several times before - but this is the first time i’ve been surrounded by phytoplankton. my limbs were glowing. every splash was like shining from shook foil. magical world.
i just signed up to join
@IWGBunion
's solidarity squad! 🔥 help us build the fightback against inequality, exploitation and oppression at work. workers deserve better - let's organise and win!
#SolidaritySquad
✊
a horrifying case with so many layers of injustice - tamil refugees trapped on diego garcia (an extant british *colony* and u.s. military base) for over a year in appalling conditions, and threatened with return to sri lanka or banishment to a “safe third country” like rwanda.
NEWS: We’ve issued a judicial review on behalf of asylum-seekers stranded on a British overseas territory exclusively serving as a UK/US military base. Our clients are being threatened with removal to Sri Lanka where they face persecution. They are crowdfunding to try & stop that
new issue of
@SocialistLawyer
arrived today.
as always, lots of good content - including a damning and moving article by the great phil scraton on police violence and institutional failures towards liverpool fans at the 2022 champions league final in paris.
The Labour Party and their coterie of journalists who dare to make this about the safety of British politicians while Palestinian life is being extirpated with Western armaments and diplomatic support.
These people are moral sewers, sanguinary cowards, genocide enablers.
A woman's been summoned to court for breaching Welsh
#COVID19
rules by organising
#BlackLivesMatter
protests in Cardiff Bay on Tuesday and Wednesday with more than 30 people.
#HeartNews
following a targeted swat raid, three people were arrested for organising legal support for activists arrested in the struggle against cop city in atlanta.
a frightening escalation of repression against basic solidarity infrastructure. i'm sure the uk gvt is taking note.
the arrestees have been charged with money laundering and charity fraud. this is clearly a post-2020 experiment in targeting things like bail funds to indirectly stifle protest and increase the damage of further repression
it's been said before but: this isn't just about Atlanta
Our place in the movement against militarization & state repression demands solidarity with all tactics on the road to liberation.
We stand in full support of the Week of Action,
#StopCopCity
movement & abolitionist organizers + activists.
Our statement:
I’ll be at this tomorrow alongside friends and comrades from all backgrounds - Muslim, Jewish, Christian, secular, from all over. All united against illegal occupation, siege and genocide.
Our government is complicit.
Show up, please - and DM me if you need someone to go with.
🚨MARCH FOR PALESTINE- END THE VIOLENCE - END APARTHEID
When: Saturday 14 October
Where: Meeting at BBC, Portland Place, W1A, London
Join us next Saturday when we march to demand Israel end its occupation of Palestinian land and apartheid rule over the Palestinian people. 🇵🇸
Just absolutely terrifying.
This is what Palestinians in Gaza are dealing with on Christmas Day (that is, when they are not being bombed to death as hundreds have been over recent days).
Praying for Motaz’s safety.
A quadcopter is above the front of my house door right now.
We are terrified and don’t know what to do
It was loaded when we first saw it but we couldn’t film it due to darkness and fear of being targeted
Absolutely scandalous stuff. The British military appears to be materially aiding and abetting the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, but politicians and the media are muzzled. The veneer of democracy fades fast in times like these.
Not one UK mainstream outlet has reported that MPs are now barred from asking questions about the UK base on Cyprus.
Or that 38 UK military aircraft have flown from that base to Israel.
Or that US is using the base to transfer weapons to Israel.
You gotta laugh. Farcical. 🤣
police are blocking the
@sdetsup
,
@FIRMCharter
protest at brook house, one of the detention centres holding people threatened with removal to rwanda. this is a crackdown on solidarity by the police state in the service of brutal government policy
@jessicamordenmp
you are actively supporting a narrative and policy approach that will lead to more suffering and deaths of people crossing the channel and more racist violence against those who arrive in britain. you,
@SKinnock
,
@JoStevensLabour
& other welsh labour mps should be ashamed.
1/ 🚨BREAKING🚨 5 of our Legal Observers are suing the Met police for arresting, detaining and assaulting them at 2021 Kill the Bill protests in London.
Lend your solidarity and support by donating to their challenge if you can, and sharing this 🧵widely:
Every Western leader who issued one-sided, carte-blanche statements about Israel’s “right to defend itself” in recent days should be made to own what happens in Gaza for the rest of their lives.
solidarity with these courageous comrades. even minor delays to the vans and coaches transferring the women can have a huge impact on whether this deportation flight goes ahead.
5 brave comrades have been arrested. Others are still standing strong.
PLEASE GET THERE IF YOU CAN. THERE IS STILL TIME TO STOP THIS FLIGHT.
#StopDeportations
#CharterFlight
#Nigeria
Facial recognition van by Borough tube station right now.
Why? I’m told it’s a “high footfall area”.
Love to have my biometrics taken without my consent on my way to get some lunch 👍🏼
We'll be using Live Facial Recognition technology at key locations in Westminster today, Friday, 1 March
This tech helps keep Londoners safe, and will be used to find people who threaten or cause harm, those who are wanted, or have outstanding arrest warrants issued by the court
"Mohamud's death and the
@swpolice
's refusal to properly inform his family or provide any details as to the circumstances of his arrest forms a new low in police-community relations."
"policing is by design intended to uphold existing social order and reinforce structural inequalities... the question is how we can reduce our reliance on police and build genuine alternatives."
great piece by
@slamble1
&
@MeganKMcElhone
.
🆕 Over-policed and under-protected
From an abolitionist perspective,
@slamble1
&
@MeganKMcElhone
argue that getting to grips with contemporary police racism demands a more expansive approach than the Casey review's call to improve service provision
And not a word of protest from the UK political and media establishment as the Israeli Defence Minister orders a genocidal "full siege" on an occupied, imprisoned civilian population (almost half of them children).
The UK is green-lighting the mass slaughter of Palestinians.
.
@RachelReevesMP
: "Gaza is not occupied by Israel"
However, UN's Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory (2022) reaffirmed the findings of others that Gaza remains occupied despite Israeli propoaganda
Likewise in the UK - which is why many decent people, including much of the “human rights community”, are so muted.
But the reputational damage any of us might face for opposing the murderous pro-war consensus pales in comparison to what Gazans are enduring right now.
this is one of the few political issues in the US rn where being very vocal actually is pretty important and could make a difference. You can tell because of how socially and professionally costly it is to do so lol
Outside my alma mater
@ucl
in solidarity with
@IWGBUoL
outsourced security guards on their third of *ten* days of strike action, against the university’s brutal fire-and-rehire scheme.
More info here:
🔒TARGET REACHED🔒
Thank you so much to everyone who has donated, especially in these very difficult times.
Your backing means so much, not least the relief against huge legal aid contributions.
The trial begins 30th May 2023 at Lewes Crown Court. We hope to see you there.
one year since the death of mohamud hassan in cardiff after being detained and in contact with 52
@swpolice
officers - still no answers for his family and friends
@justice4mohamud
, who are demanding release of the bodycam footage.
#justice4mohamudhassan
Anyone else finding it pretty hard to concentrate considering the constant drip feed of bad news + the hard right government readying itself to attack migrants, trans people, the poor (probably also women + gay people) - while fighting on behalf of oil and gas, corporations etc.
"i visited eight counties in wales, from motives of curiosity" - olaudah equiano, quoted in hochschild's book on british abolitionism. this was apparently in 1783.
are there any records of these visits? it doesn't seem like it, which is a shame.
The Home Office is training enforcement officers for anti-deportation protests.
“Staff will mimic different scenarios that the Home Office expects them to encounter when they move migrants on to aircraft bound for Kigali.”
Nasty rehearsals of barbarism.
i like rewatching this every so often as a reminder that "social miracles" of the kind big mike davis was referring to are indeed still possible, and are happening, today.
“Don’t come back to Peckham!” A walk of shame for police and immigration enforcement officers, leaving the estate after releasing the person they detained. Community solidarity works.
Vital new issue of
@Race_Class
through the post today. Includes an anatomy of the nefarious “war on woke” networks in Britain and an analysis of the gatekeeping function of black and brown right-wing ideologues in government.
I re-read Macbeth a couple of days ago and wondered what Refaat, a Shakespeare scholar, had made of it.
The truncated quotation of one of the tormented Lady Macbeth’s lines here is incredible. What a poet, what a loss. Nothing will clear Israel of this deed.
Dr. Refaat Alareer was assassinated by Israel precisely because of the power of his words. Don’t stop sharing them.
To the highest of heavens
@itranslate123
It’s striking that we hear almost nothing in the British media about Indian political prisoners such as Teltumbde. Nor about the politically-motivated assassinations of Gauri Lankesh and others. Nor the daily violence against Muslims. Fascism gets a free pass.
Professor Anand Teltumbde reflecting on his time in prison incarcerated without trial in the notorious
#BhimaKoregaon
case in India
'Prison Not The Reform Centre As Claimed, It's Centre Of Sadism' :
BREAKING: Three protestors charged with offences carrying max sentence of life imprisonment for blocking Jamaica deportations last November.
Trial will be held at Lewes Crown Court on 30th May 2023, for 7 days. Attendance welcomed!
Please support them:
the home office plans to deport people from the uk to jamaica on wednesday. the home office is a racist machine and deportations are an attack on our neighbours, families and communities. solidarity
@sdetsup
!
#Jamaica50
#StopThePlane
Every deportation flight that departs is an inhumane injustice, this flight must not depart. The Home Office's cruel deportation machine shows no sign of stopping and so we must stop it ourselves 🔥✊🏽🔥
Some have already been sentenced, in Grenoble 3/12 of defendents so far undocumented. 3 mths prison for an undocumented 22-yr old who says he went into a Foot Locker to escape tear gas. Electronic bracelet for a 19-yr-old who stole 3 shirts and 3 perfumes.
One of the highest paid “journalists” in the country and she doesn’t know what a Human Rights Act statement of compatibility is. We’re incredibly ill-served by these stenographers of power.
Our first major article about
@BenLayPlay
, by
@conky_k
for
@thetimes
. Come hear Lay’s story
@Finborough
June 13-July 8. You’ll learn about his life at sea, his vegan ways, his defense of animal rights, and his demand to abolish slavery immediately.
more great reporting from
@voice_wales
on refugee organising and solidarity in south wales: "these men have taken matters into their own hands, and through Lifeseekers Aid and with the support of the community, are defying the British state."
NEW: Reunited After Penally, Asylum Seekers Build Solidarity Against The Hostile Environment
A powerful feature by Rachel Barwell. on the unity between asylum seekers and community activists in Butetown, against persecution from the British state.
Police reinforcements have arrived and they’ve already used brute force to try to push us back but we’re still here, and we’ll remain here until the detained person is released.
This van is going nowhere! Communities resist immigration raids. More people still needed to make sure the detained person is released: Evan Cook Close, Queen's Road Peckham SE15 2HL.
😱 The Coming Indigestion 😱
The full editorial to our next issue is available to read now. Using workers' inquiries into food production, we speculating on what a revolutionary transformation could look like on a burning planet.
Full issue out soon...
“You have this whole generation that does not want to be a lost generation, it wants to be the most active generation ever. Above all, the moral dimension of all these kids. They have incredible values about race or gender, and they’re naturally disposed to be fighters.” 🥺
The new vogue on the British hard right for employing Holocaust revisionism in the service of anti-Palestinian racism is so despicable.
All I can think of is the Walter Benjamin line that
@BarnabyRaine
quoted recently: "even the dead will not be safe from the enemy if he wins".
The Nazis built the gas chambers because their officers were traumatised by shooting Jews. Hamas live-streamed their actions and gloated to their parents about the spoils of Jew murder. They are worse than Nazis, yet still, this is who people march for on the streets of Britain.
Brilliant reporting on my local park!
“Besides curbing public access to the park, events also have a major ecological impact. Particularly contentious is how councils work with events companies to redesign the park ecology to suit their needs.”
Mouayed's father is on the phone in the background "Can I ask you a question please, where is the ambulance, he is dying"
a police officer says "you're being very argumentative"
"Chicago’s schools, Atlanta’s forest. Perhaps the New York City subway...will be the site of a new left formation.
The time has come to plan and do new things; that much is clear. This clarity sometimes comes when a new name is being screamed in the street."
Sontag accepted the Jerusalem Prize in 2001, ignoring Edward Said's warning: "your acceptance of it is...a badly needed boost to [Israel's] poor international standing, a symbol that the greatest talents in the end subscribe to what Israel is doing".
deeply alarming that already this year two men have died following contact with police forces in south wales
@swpolice
@gwentpolice
. condolences to his family and loved ones.
#nojusticenopeace
"The fight to stop Cop City is a call to action for the left. The front line is there, at the intersection of environmental justice and abolition. We must protect the land to have any future."
for
@readlux
, went to the weelaunee forest on a march day to talk to people about the stop cop city movement, life in the forest, the repression, and forest defense as self defense.
with photos by irina rozovsky and an intro by
@girlcloudnine
.
“India is the biggest consumer of weapons manufactured in Israel. Indian taxpayers’ money should not be given to kill innocent Palestinian children. So India should scrap all military deals with Israel and sever diplomatic ties with it” -
@pinarayivijayan
.
comrade
@BennnyH
did a good write-up.
"It took just one person to notice a van and to put a call out to their friends... Five hours after the first text went out, 200 people filled that close and the man was free."
anand patwardhan's latest doc, his first under the modi regime, is a must-watch - streaming now on
@OVIDtv
along with the rest of his filmography (make the most of the 7-day free trial!).
@BBCSportWales
happy for rambo and being captain might be good motivation for him to stay fit and perform - but should have been ben davies imo, the most reliable and hardworking player in the squad.
Useful overview by Liz Fekete of the coordinated assault by government and legacy media on Palestine solidarity, the right to protest and freedom of expression.
“Don’t come back to Peckham!” A walk of shame for police and immigration enforcement officers, leaving the estate after releasing the person they detained. Community solidarity works.
I’m a constituent of
@MarkDrakeford
and like many, I wrote to him about the horrors we are witnessing in Palestine.
I think people in Wales should see his response.
@PrifWeinidog
UNRWA lifesaving assistance is about to end following countries decisions to cut their funding to the Agency.
Our humanitarian operation, on which 2 million people depend as a lifeline in Gaza, is collapsing. I am shocked such decisions are taken based on alleged behavior of a
NEW FEATURE:
Clapped And Scrapped: How Exploited Couriers In Wales Are Taking On The World’s Biggest Companies
@JGlynOwen
spoke to couriers unionising in Wales with
@IWGBunion
and looked at how global big business are trying to exploit platform workers
i already knew a fair bit about kissinger's many iniquities but had no idea until reading this about the role he and his consulting firm played in the 1984 bhopal disaster.