See you on Sunday
Published in Overland, 18 October, 2024
A Free Palestine protester stands accused of throwing horse manure at the cops during the mobilisation against the Land Forces weapons exposition in Naarm (Melbourne). No one else was chuckling about that incident except probably the people in this city who yell “get those animals off those horses” at the mounted units that have been deployed regularly in the past year to break regular community pickets seeking to hinder war profits. That chant is very popular at the 5 am shift anti-weapons pickets. The “antifa” taught it to the Free Palestine groups. The people love it nearly as much as they love the local hooligan song, “All Zionists are Terrorists, all Zionists are Terrorists”, though the verdict has yet to come in regarding whether it crosses the boundaries of liberal speech. I’m unsure if All Cops Are Bastards has ever been contested under Victoria’s fresh hate laws.
Every Sunday, antizionist and ACAB sticker vandalism takes place and that chant roars through the city. The officers are trying to get a pay rise, so they have put ACAB on their own vehicles: “ACAB: All Cops Are Burntout”. We live in their head rent-free. Where do the millions in tax funds for police go? Even that question can unravel the workings of an oppressive system. The regular protesters ask the police who is authorised to police the police while they go on strike. On another week, the protesters taunt the men in blue wearing riot gear, aye you’re on a protest, quit your job!
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I’ve spent every Sunday at the Free Palestine protests as an organiser and a participant. I am Palestinian, my family members have been murdered in Gaza. I have remaining family in Gaza who are surviving the genocidal onslaught. A Palestinian is not odd at a Free Palestine action, I’m the assumed subject of these political activities. Most members of the public opposed to the state’s alliance with the Zionist regime are not Palestinian, yet they have shown up for Palestine in the longest protests in modern history. They show up because they care. They care about the state of the world. They care about the state of this nation.
