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Today, antifascist protesters converged upon Spring Street in Melbourne near the Parliament of Victoria. They went there to counter racist rallies being held by Reclaim Australia and the fascist United Patriots Front.

As usual Victoria Police was also in attendance, and in the days leading to the protest it had promised a large presence and random weapons checks in response to rumours of fascists bringing weapons and intending violence.

Victoria Police’s goal for the day was to facilitate Reclaim Australia and the United Patriots Front holding their rallies out the front of Parliament House. In order to achieve this mounted officers and members of the Public Order Response Team (PORT) complemented uniformed officers on the streets, and OC (Pepper) spray was deployed against counter-protesters.

Amongst those affected by the OC Spray was a casualty who began to experience respiratory distress, a not uncommon side-effect of OC spray and other such “less-than-lethal” chemical weapons. In the course of attending to this casualty and decontaminating others who had been affected, members of the Melbourne Street Medic Collective (including one pregnant woman) were attacked by police with OC Spray and kettled in a small space at the top of Little Bourke Street.

Footage of the incident will be reviewed as it becomes available but at this point there seem to be only two explanations for the deployment of chemical weapons against the Street Medics: some witness reports have indicated that Victoria Police officers were spraying the crowd indiscriminately and did not check who they were attacking until after the fact. Others have said that police ignored the shouts of the crowd advising them that someone was receiving medical attention and with the decision to spray all medics this action should be seen as a deliberate attack upon medical personnel and their treatment space.

As one of our medics has since remarked:

“Possibly more than 100 people needed to be treated today as police indiscriminately fired pepper spray into the crowd, including onto an injured man who was struggling to breathe, was losing consciousness, and was awaiting an ambulance. They also sprayed the medics treating him. Someone had a seizure, two were taken to hospital and a few were sent home (by us as medics) due to the after-effects of the pepper spray (namely hypothermia-like symptoms of shaking and an inability to normalise body temperature). It was absolute fucking carnage and it was completely unnecessary and provocative. The racists didn’t cop any of the pepper spray at all as far as I know, and they got a three-line police escort away from the area.”

Victoria Police should rightfully be condemned for the deployment of chemical weapons, the targeting of medical personnel, casualties and medical treatment spaces with such weapons and, most of all, doing this in order to facilitate a public rally of racists and overt fascists and neo-nazis. Any assessment of the actions of antifascist protesters will conclude that they were inherently defensive: against threats of violence and the use of weapons by fascists and nazis as part of the United Patriots Front, and against the violence of racism and systematic oppression on the parts of Reclaim Australia, the United Patriots Front and Victoria Police.

The officers in command of PORT and of the event should immediately be suspended from their duties and investigations launched into how and why chemical weapons came to be used, and used against medics, injured persons and in treatment spaces. These investigations should be conducted with the possibility of demotion, termination from employment and/or laying of criminal charges (such as for assault) as outcomes.

Melbourne Street Medic Collective encourages all witnesses and concerned persons to lodge complaints with Victoria Police’s Conduct Unit and the Police Minister.

Police Conduct Unit
GPO Box 913
Melbourne VIC 3001

Telephone:1300 363 101
Email: “PSC-POLICECONDUCTUNITCOMPLAINTSANDCOMPLIMENTS@police.vic.gov.au”

Role Occupant The Hon Wade Noonan MP
Phone 03 8684 0900
Email Address wade.noonan@parliament.vic.gov.au
Portfolio Minister for Corrections
Minister for Police

Legal Aid Victoria has additional information on lodging complaints with police well worth a read.

by ·Comments Off on Banner Drop by WACA for #Gaza

On Saturday the 2nd of August a group called Whistleblowers, Activists, and Citizens Alliance (WACA) called for members and allies to unite for an action in the city to show our support for Palestine and Gaza in light of the apartheid and unjustifiable extermination of their population by the Israeli State.

Over the last few weeks we have seen the news reports, personal stories, photos and videos come through from Palestine. For the last 3 weeks in Melbourne there have been rallies in the city to condemn the actions of the Israeli State and raise awareness of the issue within the community. At each rally there has been a good turnout, the speeches have been powerful, the energy in the crowd has been palpable. Last Friday’s action still drew a large crowd in spite of Melbourne weather and we remained in #Solidaritywithgaza in not only the rain but also through 2 hailstorms. As many people in the crowd pointed out “Standing in the rain and hail is nothing when those we are in solidarity with are standing in rocket fire and white phosphorous”.

Friday night gaza rally

The reports and images coming through from Gaza has been heartbreaking, seeing the total death toll increase, and the death toll of children rise has been devastating. Listening to the Israeli Government called for the extermination of the Palestinian people has been enraging. The group had decided that more needed to be done to raise awareness in the community, to get the average Melbournian to know about what is happening in Gaza. It was decided that creating as many banners as possible and dropping them around Melbourne’s busiest areas would be the best choice for a snap direct action on a Saturday afternoon.

Sam Castro, one of the organizers of the action and member of WACA had this to say about why we need to have direct actions on the issue of Gaza and Palestine “Nothing can stop the tears and pain that must be flowing in GAZA and around the world for those already murdered in what can only be described as attempted genocide by the Israeli Apartheid State. But we can all resist publicly in our own little ways and in doing so remind each other of our humanity and the truth.  We can let the Palestinians known, that if nothing else we bare witness to the horror being inflicted on those in Gaza and the West Bank. In a violent world dominated by corporations and brutal Empires, we see you Gaza and we bare witness to the crimes of the Israeli State”.

For our drop we managed to make 5 banners with various slogans explaining our position and designed to get as much attention as possible. We decided to drop our largest banner from the Arts Centre wall, where it faced back to Flinders St Station so that anyone on the Princess St Bridge would be able to see it.
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We then placed 3 of the others on the pedestrian bridge between Flinders St Station and Crown Casino, from here anyone along the Princess St Bridge, exiting the back of Flinders St Station or in any of the Restaurants on South Yarra would be able to see the banners.

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Our final banner drop was at Federation Square, this banner received the most amount of positive attention as there was an action going on with the Iraqi Christians against ISIS happening at the other end of the square. Several attendees stopped to have photos with the banner in the back ground and some came and spoke to us as we dropped the banner and posed in our photos.
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The banner drops achieved their goal of informing the community about this atrocity. It was clear from the response of people on the pedestrian bridge that there is a large portion of the community that doesn’t know about Gaza and the ongoing genocide of Palestinians. However people were happy to engage on the topic and were just genuinely unaware and horrified to hear about the issue.

Keep an eye out for more direct actions to come across the city in relation to this issue, but also encourage your affinity groups to make a stand and do other direct actions on the issue if you feel strongly about Gaza and Palestine. It is clear that more needs to be done to educate people in the community, and also to continue to show the people in Gaza that we are witness to their suffering and the crimes against them and that we will continue to stand with them in solidarity.

For more details on the action please check out:

WACA facebook page

To watch a video filmed by WACA regarding the banner drop please watch:

WACA video of Banner Drop

For high resolution photos please check out:

Free Gaza album

Writen by CJ.

 

 

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This morning a number of medics from Melbourne Street Medic Collective attended the East-West Tunnel community picket of Lend Lease in Docklands in order to support and assist picketers. Lend Lease is being targeted as one of the fore-runners in the bidding process to build the East-West tunnel link. We have supported this campaign as individuals and as a collective for some time and plan to continue this support into the future.

This morning’s action was notable for the level of brutality and violence employed by Victoria Police against picketers. At last week’s picket, organisers arranged to allow non-Lend Lease workers to enter the building after showing ID, and a similar proposal was raised today. However, Victoria Police – seemingly reeling from the positive media coverage generated by last week’s picket – refused to allow this, and instead chose to use workers (mostly from Fujitsu) as tools to create violence and negative press coverage.

Instead of allowing small groups of workers to enter the building calmly and safely, Victoria Police used several members of the Critical Incident Response Team (CIRT) to break through the community picket and violently thrust workers into the building, while causing distress and injury to those on the picket. Victoria Police did not merely play a passive response to non-Lend Lease employees’ desires to enter the building: on a number of occasions, Victoria Police officers were seen chasing after workers who had decided not to cross the picket line in order to convince them to change their mind and provide another opportunity to inflict violence upon the peaceful picketers.

As a result of Victoria Police’s actions we were required to provide care for a number of injuries. These included minor injuries (cuts and scratches) as well as more serious ones: one person reported an injured shoulder, another received treatment for a sprained ankle. Two people were offered treatment after having their legs trampled and pinned by police and another received treatment for a head injury.

As well as providing care for injuries we provided water and rescue remedy to keep picketers hydrated and in good spirits and we can happily report that the mood was definitely positive.

It cannot be said more clearly that our need to provide medical care stemmed directly from Victoria Police’s decision to employ violence as a tactic to break the community picket. As was acknowledged in the debriefing session after the picket this morning, the Napthine Government’s use of violence to oppose the tunnel picket campaign is proof of their lack of solid justification for the project. The cynical use of workers as collateral in the attempt to destroy the tunnel picket campaign can only be condemned and shows that Victoria Police and the Napthine Government will go to great lengths to ensure this project will continue: even placing the safety of Victorians in jeopardy.

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