Samidoun Deutschland, together with the Network for Freedom for all Political Prisoners and the Freedom Committee, organized an internationalist leftist march for Palestine that took to the streets of Berlin on Saturday, 29 May. Participants gave speeches about the struggle for the liberation of Palestine and played revolutionary music, while organizations from the Turkish, Kurdish and German left movements — as well as a delegation from the Netherlands — joined the event and provided statements and expressions of solidarity.
The march wound through the Neukölln district of Berlin with enthusiastic chants of support for the Palestinian people and the struggle for the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea. Participants denounced the role of the Palestinian Authority in acting as an agent for Israel, the United States and the European Union while saluting internationalist struggles for a liberated society.
As the call for the demonstration noted, “The Palestinian cause is an internationalist, anti-colonial, anti-Zionist, anti-fascist, anti-racist and anti-imperialist cause, and struggling peoples everywhere confronting oppression, exploitation, imperialism and capitalism stand with the Palestinian people in their struggle for a liberated Palestine from the river to the sea….
From Turkey to the Philippines to Colombia to occupied Palestine, people’s movements rising up for justice face severe repression, criminalization and imprisonment. The political prisoners behind bars are true internationalist militant and vanguard of our struggles for justice…We know that the Palestinian liberation struggle does not only confront the Zionist project in occupied Palestine, the Israeli regime. The Palestinian movement is confronting imperialism and the reactionary regimes that carry out its agenda, an internationalist alliance of fascist, racist, colonialist forces.
Here in Europe, the imperialist powers of the European Union — including Germany — further mete out repression against internationalist people’s movements. Palestinian communities are targeted for repression, demonstrations banned, and police attacks unleashed against Palestinian and Arab youth. Meanwhile, Turkish and Kurdish comrades are jailed as political prisoners from Turkey to Greece to Germany for struggling for liberation.
Today, we join together in a united mobilization for justice and liberation from Palestine to the Philippines, from Turkey to Colombia, to the streets of Europe.”
The march found strong support and reception from the Palestinian and Arab public — and other passers-by — in Berlin as it marched through Neukölln. Samidoun Deutschland is organizing further events and actions for Palestine throughout Germany, and will be joining many organizations in Frankfurt on 5 June as part of the demonstration for Palestine taking place at 4 pm outside the city’s central train station.
