Solidarity Demonstration with La ZAD

As the ZAD fights for its preservation against ongoing state repression, we’ll take up the spirit of our comrades in France here in SF.

Last week the French state began evicting the ZAD (Zone to defend) – an occupation by more than 80 collectives which forced the abandonment of an airport project. The state sent 2,500 police accompanied by armored vehicles and demolition machinery to attack everything the occupied territory stands for and all that it has achieved. The ZAD is one of the longest-running projects of autonomous politics in our time, and serves as a coordinating node for radical organizing across France and Europe.

In 2011 police raided and destroyed the Occupy encampments across this country, then in 2017 a militarized force dismantled the Standing Rock camp. Now the forces of order, with constant gas and thousands of stun grenades, wish to write the ZAD into history as another thwarted possibility.

We ask you to join us on Wednesday afternoon for a demo in solidarity with our friends in France. The ZAD is not just a worldwide symbol for autonomous revolutionary struggle, but a partisan reality where thousands of people have been making another way of life possible for years. Despite every obstacle placed in their way by this world, they have succeeded beyond anyone’s wildest dreams in creating a vibrant space for encounter, for experimentation, and for freedom. Decades of struggle have culminated in a wild and fertile zone unlike anywhere on earth, and it is this living truth that the state so senselessly tramples.

The ongoing evictions are a serious blow to the collective material power patiently built on the autonomous territory in the last decade. We do not know what the coming days will bring as the police operation continues. Already buildings are destroyed, many comrades hurt and arrested. Yesterday, still under siege, 20,000 friends marched to the ZAD and began rebuilding. Major demonstrations and occupations of high schools and universities have erupted across France. To the ZADists, partisans, and revolutionaries around the world, we say: this will not be how things end. Spring is coming.

From the ZAD to the Bay – at the barricades – toward joy in communism!

For more info. on the ZAD:
https://zadforever.blog/2018/04/05/targeted-evictions-begin-monday-9th-april/
https://zadforever.blog/2018/03/12/the-zad-will-survive/

CrimethInc.’s background piece
https://crimethinc.com/2018/04/09/la-zad-another-end-of-the-world-is-possible-learning-from-50-years-of-struggle-at-notre-dame-des-landes