The Left Berlin News & Comment

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Category: Campaign of the week

Falastin Cinema Week

A week of film screenings, talks, art and more.


12/02/2025

Running parallel to the Berlinale this February, Refuge Worldwide will host Falastin Cinema Week: five days of film screenings, talks, and art exploring Palestinian histories and decolonial narratives. The events will take place at Refuge’s Niemetzstraße community space in Berlin and at Spore Initiative.

Together with AL.Berlin, Jewish Bund, Diaspora Rising, Spore Initiative, Jüdische Stimme, Irish Bloc Berlin, Rawy Films, SPACE OF URGENCY, Palinale, Amal Abu Hanna, House Of Base, and more, Falastin Cinema Week is scheduled to run daily from Monday 17th February to Friday 21st February.

Although a tentative ceasefire is in place, February 2025 will mark the 77th year of the occupation. We call for an end to the apartheid regime, the right to return, sovereignty, and self-determination for all Indigenous Palestinian and Levantine people. We stand in solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement and with all interconnected decolonial struggles.

The full programme and tickets are available on the Refuge Worldwide website.

The artwork visual is a film still from O, Persecuted, courtesy of Basma al-Sharif. Commissioned by the Palestine Film Foundation to make a film in response to Kassem Hawal’s 1974 Our Small Houses, O, Persecuted uses the act of restoration to force the burden of history onto an unforeseen future. Graphics are by Bianca Mocan.

Access Info

Refuge Worldwide’s community space is located at Niemetzstraße 1, 12055 Berlin. All the rooms used for the event are step-free and located on the ground floor. There is a gender-neutral step-free toilet that’s accessible for wheelchair users.

There will be a variety of seating options: chairs and beanbags.

We encourage guests to do COVID-19 tests before coming and will also have some tests available at the door.

No one will be turned away due to lack of funds.

If you have any access requests, please email nicky@refugeworldwide.com

Alerta Antifascista Berlin

None of us is free until everyone is free.


05/02/2025

Neo-fascism is spreading its international authoritarian web, and we need to connect. Alerta Antifascista Berlin fights all forms of oppression, from Berlin to Gaza. We’re here to learn from and support each other. We analyse the methods used by repressive states in different countries. Our goal is to spread this knowledge far and wide, so that all comrades can benefit from it.

We organise events, screenings and book presentations, and we keep an eye on the reactionary International to stay ahead and counteract. We will fight them on social media and on the streets, across all continents.

On Sunday, 9th February, we are showing the documentary Infiltrados (Infiltrators) in the Media Space k18 (Kreutzigerstr 18). This documentary analyses the tactics used by infiltrators to get in and out of social movements and some of their mistakes. It gives a voice to their victims, who describe how they were used by people with whom they had sexual and emotional relationships.

We plan further film showings, book presentations and other events in the coming months. For more information, contact us at alertaantifascistaberlin@proton.me.

Association of Palestinian and Jewish Academics

Countering the Repressive Discourse on Palestine/Israel


29/01/2025

We are Palestinian and Jewish academics with personal, professional, and institutional ties to Germany and other German-speaking countries. We are organized to counter the development of repressive discourses, policies, and actions related to Palestine/Israel. Our association includes scholars of the histories, religions, laws, cultures and politics of the region, as well as of Palestinian and Jewish diasporic cultures. Our collaboration is built upon our lived experiences, professional expertise, and ethical commitments. Please see our statement for a full explanation of our principles.

We came together in early 2024 with a commitment to building a sustainable organizational structure within which we could foster critical academic research, teaching and advocacy in a climate of increased threats to academic freedom, particularly in relation to Palestine solidarity. Inspired by student campus activism both in Germany and internationally and disturbed by the silences and limited interventions of colleagues, we committed ourselves to working in solidarity with each other at bringing Palestinian and critical Jewish academic voices to bear on scholarly and public debates.

Abolish Frontex

Stop all deportation! End detention!


22/01/2025

Frontex is the personification of the EU’s repressive migration and border policies. The agency plays a leading role in EU border security and control work, deportations, cooperation with third countries and contacts with the military and security industry. In the last few years its powers, budgets and number of employees have rapidly increased. It can now give binding advice to EU member states to strengthen border security efforts and can even intervene in their border security affairs, when the Council decides to do so upon a proposal by the European Commission.

While part of Frontex’ new mandate is the building of its own standing border guards corps and equipment pool, it nevertheless depends on EU member states making personnel and equipment available to run its operations. Member states also usually request Frontex assistance, in the form of operations or otherwise.

NGOs legitimising Frontex

Frontex has a Consultative Forum, which “brings together key European institutions, international and civil society organisations to advise the European Border and Coast Guard Agency in Fundamental rights matters.” Instead of having a serious role in addressing Frontex’s role in human rights violations, this forum acts as a tool to legitimize the existence of Frontex and these violations, by providing the agency with the appearance of approval and in-house control mechanisms.

What we’re calling for:

  • Abolish Frontex
  • End all Frontex operations and remove all Frontex presence currently deployed
  • Stop the push-backs and the pull-backs
  • EU member states refuse to participate in Frontex missions – logistically (contribution of equipment and assets) and personnel-wise
  • EU member states stop requesting Frontex support for border operations and deportations
  • Cut Frontex’s budget and reject any proposed expansion
  • Disband the Frontex standing corps
  • Stop hiring new Frontex staff
  • Redirect spending on border protection towards services and resources for migrants, social services, welfare, health, education and transitioning towards a low-carbon economy
  • NGOs: leave Frontex’s Consultative Forum

More information here

Remembering means Fighting

19th January. Day of solidarity with antifascists in Russia, Ukraine and other post-Soviet republics


15/01/2025

January 19, 2009 – the day our anti-fascist comrades Stanislav Markelov and Anastasia Baburova were murdered in cold blood by Nazis in the center of Moscow. This date has become memorable and symbolic for all those fighting fascism in Russia, Ukraine, and other former Soviet republics.

Today, we, Russian-speaking migrant anti-fascists, are witnessing in Germany the problems we know well: the rise of anti-immigrant sentiment, right-wing violence, and the fascization of public life. Even according to official data, 2024 was a record year in terms of right-wing, radically motivated crimes in Germany, more than a thousand of which were violent. The tragedy in Hanau on February 19, 2020, when racism motivated the murder of nine people, vividly demonstrates what ignoring such threats can lead to.

Right-wing resentment has contributed to the acceptance of an imperialist war against Ukraine in Russian society. This war, in turn, influences the legitimization of violence both outside and inside the country, as well as the rise of right-wing sentiment and militarism around the world.

We believe that our experience in the anti-fascist struggle can be important for our German comrades!
On January 19th, we will honor the memory of Anastasia, Stanislav, and all comrades who died in Russia at the hands of right-wing extremists: Timur Kacharava, Alexander Ryukhin, Ilya Borodaenko, Alexei Krylov, Fyodor Filatov, Ilya Dzhaparidze, and Ivan Khutorsky. We will also remember victims of far-right anti-migrant violence, such as Shamil Adamanov and Khursheda Soltonova.

Our action will take place on a street named after Silvio Mayer, an anti-fascist killed by right-wing militants in Friedrichshain in the early 90s. In St. Petersburg, the city where musician and anti-fascist Timur Kacharava was killed in 2005, an action in 2011 symbolically renamed a street in his honor. We hope that someday this gesture will also become a reality.

The procession along the street named after Silvio Mayer will be a reminder of all victims of right-wing terror and a call for international solidarity in the fight against fascism in all its forms.

To remember means to fight!

The struggle continues. ¡No pasarán!

Demo in Berlin. 19th January 2025, 1pm, Silvio-Meier-Straße (near U-Bahn Samaratinerstraße)