Free Joel! An­ti­fa­scism is self-​de­fence!

freedom-for-joel

Am Samstag den 14.12.2013 wurde in Kärrtorp ein Vorort von Stockholm eine antirassistische Demonstration von etwa 30 Nazis die zur Svensk Motståndsrörelse (Schwedische Widerstandsbewegung, SMR) gehören mit Steinen, Knüppeln, Flaschen, Messern und Feuerwerkskörpern angeriffen.

Die Demonstration richtete sich gegen Nazi-Graffiti die seit einiger Zeit in Kärrtrop verbreitet werden.

Joel und andere Antifaschit_innen verteidigten sich gegen den Nazi-Angriff. Wenige Tage nach dieser Auseinandersetzung wurde der Antifa Joel verhaftet. Die Staatsanwaltschaft wirft Joel versuchten Mord vor und plädiert auf eine Freiheitsstrafe von 7 Jahren. Am 29.04.2014 wurde Joel jetzt zu 6,6 Jahren Knast verurteilt, weil er eine Antirassistische-Demo gegen Nazis verteidigte!

Freiheit für Joel!

 https://www.facebook.com/freejoel

 http://antifapinneberg.blogsport.de/index.php?s=Joel

Noch ein Brief von Joel aus dem Knast:

So, today the ver­dict will fall. The ques­ti­on is if it will be in pro­por­ti­on to what hap­pen­ed in the Stock­holm sub­urb of Karr­t­orp? Will it be in pro­por­ti­on to the ver­dicts that were de­li­ver­ed to the nazis? Pro­bab­ly not. The pro­se­cu­tor have cal­led for a 7 year pu­nish­ment. This is the very same pro­se­cu­tor who was happy with a few months of jail-​ti­me for the Nazis who at­ta­cked the peace­ful ma­ni­fe­sta­ti­on. The same pro­se­cu­tor who, in the clo­sing ar­gu­ment, said that it was en­ough to ask peop­le to go to a peace­ful ma­ni­fe­sta­ti­on to be jud­ged as a lea­der.

I have no il­lu­si­on about wal­king out today as a free man. I would lie if I told you that I wouldn‘t think it would feel hard with 7 years of jail-​ti­me, but it wouldn‘t chan­ge any­thing. I am and will al­ways re­main a de­vo­ted anti fa­scist, and on the outside so­me­o­ne else will stand in my place. This let­ter will be the last I write to this page, after that my wish is that it will be used for the sup­port of other anti fa­scists. The witch hunt for anti fa­scists has only just begun, and many more are wait­ing for their turn to stand trial for what hap­pen­ed in Karr­t­orp. In any case, this is my let­ter.

I grew up in the town of Lin­ko­ping du­ring the 80’s and 90’s. At that time Lin­ko­ping was the cen­ter for the pro­duc­tion of white power-​mu­sic in all of Eu­ro­pe. There were se­ver­al Nazi or­ga­niza­t­i­ons and the streets were craw­ling with fa­scists. The Nazis mur­de­red, as­saul­ted and threa­tened peop­le. For a fact, in 1997 they at­ta­cked a peace­ful anti ra­cist de­mons­tra­ti­on in the same way they re­cent­ly did in Karr­t­orp.

I re­mem­ber how I, as a 7 year old, for the first time got cal­led a wog/wet­back. This was in 1986. Today it’s 2014, and today when my 6 year old son was on the way to visit me he got cal­led the same thing. Some things never chan­ge. Ra­cists spread their dis­gus­ting hate, and the fa­scists at­tack an­yo­ne who dare stand up against them.

The po­li­ce were not able to de­fend the anti ra­cist de­mons­tra­ti­on in Lin­ko­ping in 1997, just like they were un­able to de­fend the ma­ni­fe­sta­ti­on in Karr­t­orp six­teen years later. The dif­fe­rence is that in Lin­ko­ping only a few dared to de­fend them­sel­ves, in Karr­t­orp we were over one hund­red. We stay­ed to­ge­ther, and we drove the Nazis away!

So, about the vio­lence. This is where the ar­gu­mens about dif­fe­rent sides of the same coin come to play. Nar­cis­sists like the so cal­led jour­na­lists Janne Jo­sefs­son and Jan Guill­ou shed cro­co­di­le tears and talk about how it should be im­pos­si­ble to claim self de­fen­se when so­me­o­ne has got­ten stab­bed in the back. But to un­der­stand th vio­lence we have to take a look at what ac­tual­ly hap­pen­ed:

About 30 Nazis at­tack a peace­ful ma­ni­fe­sta­ti­on. The Nazis had armed them­sel­ves with stick, glass bott­les and kni­fes. At least one of the Nazis rus­hed the peace­ful ma­ni­fe­sta­ti­on with a drawn knife in his hand. Se­ver­al kni­fes were later found in the vicini­ty of where the Nazis fi­nal­ly got ar­rested. Se­ver­al of the Nazis who par­ti­ci­pa­ted in the at­tack have pre­vious­ly been con­vic­ted of vio­lent at­tacks when peop­le have been stab­bed, even kil­led. At the time of the at­tack there were only six po­li­ce­men pre­sent, all of whom have said that they had no pos­si­bi­li­ty to pro­tect the ma­ni­fe­sta­ti­on, they were out­num­be­red. The Nazi who got stab­bed was in the first line of at­ta­ckers, hea­vi­ly in­vol­ved in figh­ting with the anti ra­cist de­mons­tra­tors. He got stab­bed at the Karr­t­orp squa­re, be­fo­re po­li­ce rein­force­ments had ar­ri­ved. All of this is al­re­a­dy pro­ven, all of these things are facts.

It might seem cold and mer­ci­less to stab so­me­o­ne with a knife. But plea­se con­s­i­der the si­tua­ti­on and what the Swe­dish Nazi mo­ve­ment have shown ca­pa­ble of (se­ver­al stab­bings and even mur­ders du­ring the re­cent years) and that the po­li­ce them­sel­ves have said they had no means to pro­tect us. Ad the fact that at least one of the Nazis, pro­bab­ly more of them, had drawn kni­fes du­ring the at­tack. Sum all of this to­ge­ther and then maybe you can get a glim­pse of all of the things that were rus­hing through my mind at that time. With that said I want to ad that vio­lence must never ever be­co­me a mean of its own, it must al­ways be ana­ly­zed and other ways of ac­tion must al­ways be con­s­i­de­red. In Karr­t­orp it was a tac­tical ne­ces­si­ty to strike back.

Fi­nal­ly I again want to thank ever­yo­ne who have show­ed their sup­port for me and my fa­mi­ly. It means the world to me. And to all of you who con­ti­nue the strugg­le against ra­cism and fa­scism in your schools, at your work­pla­ces, in art and music or on the streets – I love you!

Stay to­ge­ther and take care of one ano­ther.

Kee­pers of the Faith /Joel