Contribution to the Internationalist Days in Prague May 20-26, 2024
First of all, I want to congratulate and salute the comrades from Třídní Válka, for their commitment and perseverance. In these last two sad years of war they have been active, including and especially in contacting revolutionary groups abroad, something that – in my opinion – few in our latitudes have done.
That said, I must point out, alas, a couple of issues. I have been invited (as has the entire editorial staff of “Bezmotivny”) to the week of international action against the war, to be held in Prague between May 20 and 26, 2024. As editor of the internationalist anarchist fortnightly “Bezmotivny,” it is fair to say that I will not be able to attend. Or at least, between now and May is a long time, but I don’t think the provisions the Italian state has imposed on us will change.
In fact, on August 8, 2023, we were all subjected to precautionary measures on charges of subversive association for the purpose of terrorism, incitement to commit a crime with the aggravating factor of the purpose of terrorism, insulting the honor or prestige of the president of the republic, and clandestine printing, for having, over a period of three years, published incessantly every fortnight the newspaper “Bezmotivny.”
The operation conducted by the District Anti-Mafia and Anti-Terrorism Directorate of the city of Genoa involved ten anarchists for whom arrest in prison had been requested. Some still have an obligation to stay (with overnight return) in their city, others have hopped between jail and house arrest with all the restrictions (prohibition to communicate with anyone, under penalty of jail). Currently there are four of us on house arrest, five on mandatory residence, and one at large. The whole repressive operation revolves around “our” newspaper, they do not accuse us of specific facts except precisely the editing, printing and distribution of “Bezmotivny.”
It seems important to me to say all this, because the repression operating in Italy (not only the one we were involved in, but during 2023 it affected many anarchists all over Italy) is fully part of the policies of war moved by this rotten country.
I don’t want to complain about this at all, I think it is normal and deeply consistent on the part of a state to arrest any revolutionary voice, so in truth I’m fine with the way it works, rather than the fringe pretense of democratic spaces I prefer the real struggle. Rather than dissenting games good only for political stands, I prefer confrontation.
However. I think your initiative is extremely important, as well as interesting.
Not only because of the current times, but because it goes to reiterate what are the basics of revolutionary internationalist struggle.
I am not an educated man, I barely have an eighth grade education, so I often struggle to understand a lot of talk about economic or geopolitical partitions of various countries, but I am very safe in admitting that war is always for the benefit of the masters against us proletarians. This I could perceive also and only by working.
There is no different dimension for capital. Its survival is at the expense of all the exploited.
What I would consider important to say, however, concerns the method of us revolutionaries. I don’t know your fascinating country-as I don’t know many others-but, as far as Italy is concerned, there has been, over the years, a huge disconnect with the real movement, that is, with the exploited. It has stopped reiterating that the movement is not the collectives, or a political group (or worse, a party), but it is all the exploited. This is the real movement. Those who suffer the anguish of the master class every day. Whether they are aware of it, or even organize matters little. This is the real movement. This is what I think it is important to interact with. And it is in this direction that we have tried to work with “Bezmotivny,” albeit with our limitations, trying to bring among other exploited people the sense of rightness of revolutionary violence.
I will be very clear, I am what mass-media journalists call an “insurrectionalist.” A term that has been adopted in the media in Italy for half a century now to refer to “bad” anarchists. And I find it very hard to reject the accusation. Why is that? Then again, insurrection is the least that an exploited person like me, like all of us, can expect. I can confidently say that it is a boast for me.
With respect to revolutionary internationalism, I would like to open a brief parenthesis. In recent years we have witnessed what has become a methodological “practice” of action: namely, that of communicating only through actions. I think this is an important subject for reflection and discussion. Because, interesting as it is, it is a lame affair, which, however just and respectable, fails to gloss over so many matters, and as internationalists they are dutiful to address.
Internationalists cannot live only in the shadow of claims, of actions, however just and important and to be supported (at least of direct actions, attacks on structures and men of the State and Capitalism, all over the world, there are indeed many, and that is no small thing). We have to be able to initiate real communication, which has a capacity for action on all fronts, which is not limited to information but tries to make efforts toward organizational and therefore operational approaches. We need to be able to make the effort to get to know each other, to delve into the problems we want to unselect and those we want to baste.
This I know is not at all easy. Even and only in small territories like Italy there is often little communication between comrades who live close to each other, but I still think it is important to reiterate the need to make efforts, and to fly in the face of what may seem to be disagreements but then are ultimately not at all concrete.
Of course, where the reasoning becomes incongruous it is right to take different paths, but the attempt to adopt approaches of real (and not virtual) interaction between comrades I think is always very appreciable and, quite simply, useful and right.
I really hope that this meeting will be, more than highly attended, qualitatively attended. May it then be able to contribute seriously, with meaningful interventions, to the struggle against war therefore in the direction of attacking every state, which by its nature is warmongering.
LONG LIVE THE REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE
Luigi Palli
January 28, 2024
PDF: Contributo alle giornate internazionaliste a Praga dal 20 al 26 maggio 2024
[Received by e-mail and published at https://lanemesi.noblogs.org/post/2024/02/07/contributo-alle-giornate-internazionaliste-a-praga-dal-20-al-26-maggio-2024/