Rolling Stone, “Inside America’s Secret War with ISIS”
The Kurds are no longer communists but adhere to a far-left, anarcho-feminist ideology closer to Occupy Wall Street than to anything in the Middle East. Their autonomy movement, known as the Rojava Revolution, has attracted leftist volunteers from six continents, but Turkey, under its increasingly authoritarian Islamist president, Recep Tayyip Erdoan, is obsessed with preventing […]
The Herald Sun (NC), “They’re leftists with guns. Meet the Redneck Revolt”
Redneck Revolt started as the John Brown Gun Club, a community defense organization in Lawrence, Kansas, around 2004. It was part of a larger anarchist cooperative group known as Kansas Mutual Aid, according to Redneck Revolt podcast. Continue Reading
CityLab, “Lab Report: How Phoenix Prevented Chaos in Trump’s Visit”
Aside from the odd anarcho-communist gun club, there were barely any armed groups either—and that’s in a proudly open-carry state. Continue Reading
The Intercept, “Is the Queer Brigade Fighting ISIS in Syria a Force for Liberation or Alienation?”
TQILA is a small unit within the International Revolutionary People’s Guerrilla Forces — a battalion of self-identified anarchist foreign fighters who traveled to support the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in their fight against ISIS. While some have questioned whether TQILA actually exists, the group has released several photos ostensibly from Raqqa, including one sending […]
Al Jazeera, “Decolonising Syria’s so-called ‘queer liberation'”
TQILA tells us that it was formed to fight “authority, patriarchy and oppressive heteronomativity, queer/homophobia and transphobia” and explains how “the images of gay men being thrown off roofs and stoned to death” by ISIL was something they “could not idly watch“. Their umbrella group, IRPGF, tells us that their role is “to be an armed […]
Newsweek, “Kurdish Militia Denies Ties to Foreign Fighters Claiming New LGBT Unit in Syria”
On Monday, the International Revolutionary People’s Guerrilla Forces (IRPGF), an anarchist movement made up of international volunteers in northern Syria, announced what it said was a new LGBT unit to battle “not only Daesh but capitalism and the state.” The unit gave its name as the Queer Insurrection and Liberation Army, or TQILA. The IRPGF […]
The Intercept, “To Syria and Back”
Öcalan’s 47-page text — heavily influenced by anarchist and libertarian theory — outlines his vision of a stateless, participatory democracy that is controlled and structured at a grassroots level through voluntary meetings and councils. In Rojava, the YPG has attempted to put Öcalan’s principles into practice, using his pamphlet as a sort of blueprint for […]
Newsweek, “Oscar López Rivera: Terrorist to Some, Hero to Others”
At 1:22 p.m., as Connor and his colleagues were finishing lunch, a bomb consisting of five sticks of dynamite stuffed into a duffel bag tore through the restaurant, The New York Times reported that victims “were hurled from their tables in a confusion of screams and flying debris.” It was the most deadly bombing in New […]
Mother Jones, “A New Wave of Left-Wing Militants Is Ready to Rumble in Portland—and Beyond”
Redneck Revolt: This network, largely made up of anarchists and libertarians, is focused on anti-racist organizing among the white working class. Inspired by the Young Patriots—white Appalachian activists who allied with the Black Panthers in the late 1960s—the group now claims chapters in more than 30 regions. Redneck Revolt’s members can speak to their neighbors […]
Madison.com, “Feds file gun theft charge against Joseph Jakubowski, captured Friday”
Attempts to get answers from Jakubowski are continuing in earnest. Authorities say that Jakubowski is an anarchist who mailed his rambling 161-page manifesto criticizing government, law enforcement and religion to Trump, burglarized the gun shop, burned his car in a desolate area and then took off with the stolen guns as part of a plan, […]