[News] Flood the Gates: Escalate

[Anti-Imperialist News]

mondoweiss.net <https://mondoweiss.net/2024/05/flood-the-gates-escalate/>
Flood the Gates: Escalate
By Palestine Action US <https://mondoweiss.net/author/palestine-action-us/> May
1, 2024 <https://mondoweiss.net/2024/05/flood-the-gates-escalate/>
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[image: GMauABGWQAEcPf8.jpeg]

“The beginning of every revolution is an exit, an exit from the social
order that power has enshrined in the name of law, stability, public
interest, and the greater good.”
martyr Bassel Al-Araj <https://www.thebadside.net/tbs-2-exiting-law>

“And it follows that if a thing is not building, it is certainly decaying —
that life is revolution — and that the world will die if we don’t read and
act out its imperatives.”
martyr George Jackson
<https://files.libcom.org/files/2022-08/BloodInMyEye_text_0.pdf>

It has been 208 days since this most recent and most horrific chapter of
the 75-year U.S.-zionist genocide in Gaza began. Over 40,000 Palestinians
have been martyred, but the actual death toll is likely upward of 100,000.
Despite the mobilizations of millions around the world, we must acknowledge
that we have not been able to stop the genocide — we have not come even
close. *This is a failure, but not a defeat. It demands we reckon with our
errors and recalculate our strategy to win.*

After October 7, we recognized immediately the need for escalatory
resistance to imperialism’s escalating violence. Inspired by the success of
Palestine Action UK’s campaign, we launched Palestine Action US, a direct
action network targeting Elbit Systems, the largest zionist weapons company
on earth. As new Palestine Action groups have formed globally, our actions
have contributed to divestments from Elbit, drops in Elbit’s profits, the
sale of a U.S. Elbit subsidiary, and the permanent closing of another Elbit
factory in the UK. *Through our many trials and errors, we also learned
that tactics used in the UK, which has a very different legal system and
economic makeup, could not simply be copy-pasted into the U.S.
context. Instead of solely targeting Elbit, we have expanded our scope to
meet the urgent task of building capacity for direct action and militancy
in the U.S. anti-imperialist movement.*

We make this intervention at a moment when escalation is more realizable
than ever. On April 15, we saw a coordinated yet decentralized
action that drove people across the world to take direct action against
points of production and logistics networks, including ports, bridges,
weapons manufacturers, and financial institutions, targeting the very
economic arteries of imperialism. Then, on April 17, students and other
young people launched dozens of Gaza solidarity encampments across the
U.S., from Columbia to Cal Poly, occupying and barricading buildings,
establishing liberated zones, and defeating police invasions. In mere
weeks, the anti-imperialist movement in the Belly of the Beast has advanced
to a level of militancy not seen in generations. But the genocide is
ongoing and the zionist invasion of Rafah is imminent. We still have
a long way to go to break the war machine.

*Here are 5 of our reflections*:

   1. *Above all else, ESCALATE*. We join in the calls to #Escalate4Gaza
   beyond symbolic action because we know power won’t move unless we strike
   fear in the heart of the ruling class and pose a threat to their
   reproduction of capital. As our comrades from Within Our Lifetime wrote,
   *“**Enough with de-escalation trainings; Where are the escalation
   trainings*!” Escalate from mass rallies to mass blockades of weapons
   companies, from encampments to building occupations, from getting kettled
   by the police to kettling them back. Let repression breed more resistance.
   We will not disavow any actions taken to escalate the struggle, including
   militant direct actions. Our notion of “safety” in the imperial core is
   built on centuries of corpses, and this liberal framing of “safetyism
   <https://itsgoingdown.org/we-dont-need-safety-we-need-to-escalate/>”
   prevents us from escalating and winning, which is our duty to Palestine and
   to us all. *We keep ourselves safe by escalating. Don’t hesitate to take
   more risk.*
   2. *Resist repression and abandon symbolic arrests*. We regret using
   this self-sacrificial tactic ourselves at times. While actions sometimes
   result in arrests, and those engaged in serious action ought to prepare for
   that outcome, it should never be the *goal* to lose our organizers to the
   carceral system. The goal should always be to achieve whatever we set out
   to achieve, and then get home safe. Our most successful actions were covert
   and decentralized. Form an affinity group or cell with people you trust,
   and take action; when confronted by police, learn tactics to protect
   yourself and your comrades – barricades, de-arrest, strategic formations,
   and community defense (we have compiled many resources
   <https://pad.riseup.net/p/r.9dd54a8110dea91811c5412dcd7c2180> on these
   tactics). As our comrades at Cal Poly
   <https://crimethinc.com/2024/04/23/report-from-within-the-cal-poly-humboldt-occupation-the-occupation-of-siemens-hall>
   wrote, “*The pro-Palestinian movement must be a movement against the
   police*.” We must no longer be a sea of helpless subjects, begging for
   crumbs and crying foul at the bullying of the pigs. We must stop appealing
   to the respectability of monsters, to whom we owe nothing.
   3. *Break open the university gates*. To those holding down campus
   occupations, your first task is to open the campus to the community and
   reject the distinction between students and “outside agitators.” The
   popular movement for Palestine is currently based out of the universities,
   but students are not the sole leaders, and non-students possess a reservoir
   of knowledge and experience to expand the struggle beyond the campus. We
   must create our own “popular cradle” of resistance. The most effective
   occupations have been where students have strong alliances with
   non-students, and where they connect the struggle to Free Palestine with
   the struggle against U.S. fascism and Cop Cities everywhere.
   4. *Diversity of tactics only works if we are building more militancy*.
   We have always called for a wide ecosystem of tactics, from boycotts to
   mass rallies to the sabotage and dismantling of genocidal infrastructure.
   There is a dialectical relationship between the underground and
   aboveground; clandestine actions need to express the general will of the
   movement and garner support from its above-ground organizers. As long as
   other groups do not interfere, peace police, or co-opt our militancy, we
   must build as broad possible unity, inspired by the Palestinian
   resistance’s concept of “Unity of the Fields
   <https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/post/2024/04/30/on-campus-action-and-the-unity-of-the-fields/>,”
   whereby, despite our differing ideologies, short-term objectives, and
   locations, we all can work towards one common goal. We need people doing
   jail support, media, fundraising, and community care — but it is time for
   more of us to step up to the front line.
   5. *We in the U.S. are not exempt from resistance*. It is insincere to
   glorify the Palestinian resistance if, at the same time, we do not raise
   our own resistance here. The siege on Gaza is a rehearsal of the future the
   ruling class has planned for all oppressed people if we do not resist. When
   we step into the international struggle in a substantive way, we reclaim
   our power and our humanity; we stop bickering over which futile means will,
   or (almost certainly) won’t shame the oppressor into a state of reasonable
   concession, and we recognize that building an infrastructure of militancy
   for the larger struggle against imperialism and the establishment of a new
   world is the only effective route we can take, and is, in fact, the easier,
   softer way. Our resistance to the genocide in Gaza is a piece of that
   effort, or it is theater. We are not naïve enough to think the revolution
   will come through “peaceful” means or spontaneous uprisings without
   organized militancy. Nor do we think that the self-proclaimed vanguard of
   the “organized” left, the student bureaucrats and smooth-talkers without an
   ounce of front-line experience, are capable of fomenting the kinds of
   organization actually required in this moment. The new forms of leadership
   and initiative will emerge from those barricaded inside classroom
   buildings, those who carry shields, and who are kicking back tear gas
   canisters. Rebellious movements must prepare to defend themselves from
   repression during states of siege, and “to outmaneuver, exhaust,
   demoralize, confuse, and overpower the repressive might of the state. Those
   who do not believe this is possible do not believe that the revolution is
   possible.” *We know revolution will come within our lifetimes. We will
   make sure of it.*

Download this article as a zine
<https://mondoweiss.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Escalate-Zine-1.pdf> or
as a PDF
<https://mondoweiss.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Escalate-PDF-1.pdf>.

Palestine Action US is a direct action network disrupting and dismantling
zionism and U.S. imperialism. Join us by taking autonomous action. You can
submit your actions to *palestineactionus at proton.me
<palestineactionus at proton.me>*.
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