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June 2, 2013 – Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal/Green
Left Weekly -- When the humble “Occupy Gezi” (Occupy Promenade Park)
protest in Istanbul’s Taksim Square was brutally attacked on May 31 by police
and spread like wildfire throughout Istanbul and into other cities, the Turkey’s
left was in the thick of it.
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| A corner of Gezi Park next to Taksim Square (photo Siv O'Neall) |
In the early days of the protest, Sirri Sureyya Onder (national MP
for the umbrella organistion of the Turkish-Kurdish left, the Peoples’
Democratic Congress, the HDK)
lay his body, with the others, in front of bulldozers to stop them destrying
the park’s 70-year-old trees. When he spoke to the media he was angry. He asked
why the “idiot” alternative mayoral candidates were not there to defend this
small green pocket of Taksim. When police attacked in the early hours of May
31, Onder again lay in front of the bulldozers. He was one of the first
casualties to be taken to hospital.
Two days earlier the headline in the socialist daily Evrensel
highlighted the potential 300 million Turkish lira that multinational companies
stood to make from the construction of a new, third bridge accross the
Bosphorus between Asia and Europe. On the day, Turkey’s Prime Minster Tayyip
Erdogan laid the foundation stone at a launch ceremony, Evrensel
reported the project would require destruction of 2.5 million trees.
Opposition to a third international airport and countless other
destructive urban development plans of the Islamist ruling class -- a “class of
looters” -- have been central to the left’s agenda.
Turkey’s left is well aware of
environmental issues and very active around them. There have been hundreds of
demonstrations by villagers against hydroelectric dams led by the left. Even in
the midst of a civil-war environment, Kurdish people have been organising
against the military’s burning of forests -- to uncover Kurdish guerillas
hiding there.
With 53% support the Islamist government is arrogant. It has
groomed ordinary people’s Islamic beliefs, arrested fascist generals (one in three
generals are now in prison) and coup leaders, started peace negotiations with
the Kurdish freedom movements and won three elections in a row.
“The decision is made. The project [demolition of Gezi Park] will
continue”, said Tayyip Erdogan after four days of
Taksim clashes. “If you gather 200,000 people, I will gather 1 million."
But Erdogan has stumbled recently. His
attempt to ban abortion provoked
a huge backlash. His vision for a religious
Turkish youth was badly received. He
foolishly suggested that ayran (a watery yoghurt drink) should be the
“national drink” ahead of raki (the beloved aniseed-based spirit) and
introduced a law that banned sales of
alcohol between 10 pm and 6 am. His mass jailing of
journalists has also been unpopular.
When he laid the foundation of the third
Bosphorus bridge he announced it would be called the Sultan Selim. Selim was a
16th century Ottoman emperor who butchered thousands of Allevis, ensuring that
Turkey became, and remains, dominated by Sunni Muslims. He ignored the feelings
of the estimated 20 million Allevis living in Turkey today.
The chain of clashes spreading across
Turkey from Gezi Park is a huge blow to the PM’s arrogance. For the first time
he has appeared in defensive mode and “sincerely” asked protesters to go home.
Taksim Square has a special place in the
heart of the Turkish left. We call it “May Day Square”. On May Day 1977 the
square was bathed in the blood of dozens of workers and students who were among
more than 100,000 people marching with red flags that day. Unknown killers
opened fire at the crowd from top of buildings surrounding the square.
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| The beginning of the Promenade, Istiklal Caddesi, going south from Taksim Square (photo Siv O'Neall) |
It remains an unsolved crime. Turkey’s left
believes the perpetrators were NATO’s clandestine anti-communist paramilitary, Operation Gladio.
The Turkish government banned May Day
marches ever since and every May Day there have been hundreds of clashes
between police and demonstrators who want to march to Taksim. Taksim Square is
the Turkish left’s symbol of resistance.
The interior minister admitted during an
answer to an opposition MP’s question in parliament that on May Day 2013 police
sprayed 14 tons of tear gas on demonstrators.
The Gezi Park resistance has brought
much needed Turkish-Kurdish unity to the left opposition. Kurdish cities have joined
the solidarity protests. Kurds, Turks, secularists, social democrats and nationalists
merged in the clashes against police brutality. The left, with its “Taksim
passion”, has played a leading role in the protests.
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| Evening on the Promenade, Istiklal Caddesi, starting at Taksim Square, with one of the historic streetcars.
(photo Siv O'Neall) |
The mainstream media’s blackout of the protests
– which is unprecedented – has brought the leftist media to the fore. Left-wing
Hayat Television
has been covering the protests non-stop, live.
There has been a protest outside the
headquarters of national broadcaster NTV for turning a blind eye to the protests.
Benjamin Harvey, Turkey
bureau chief for Bloomberg tweeted,
“Turks who aren’t in Istanbul and don’t
get their news from the internet may have no idea anything is even going on
here now.”
The Gezi Park resistance is a turning
point for the people of Turkey. After many decades they feel their power again.
It has reminded the left that they can lead the people’s spontaneous action.
By I. Zekeriya Ayman, a Kurdish Turkish leftist living in
Melbourne, Australia.
The Right to the City movement and the Turkish summer
June 1, 2013 -- Jadaliyya -- As I
write this, Istanbul is under siege. The might of Istanbul's entire
police force—the largest city police force in Europe—is violently
cracking down on peaceful occupiers in Gezi Park.
The
protest, which began on 27 May, is ostensibly over a planned shopping
center to be built over a park in Istanbul's central Taksim Square.
Nevertheless, massive popular movements like this do not emerge out of
nowhere. Typically, they are the result of the tireless groundwork of
activists over the course of an extended period. And then, something
happens: a spark sets off the lighter fluid accumulating unnoticed at
everyone's feet.
The
protests began with approximately seventy Right to the City protesters
in Gezi Park on 27 May when demolition of the park was set to begin.
These activists successfully stopped demolition and a little more than a
dozen activists spent that night in the park. They erected two large
tents, brought guitars, and made their opinions known to passersby.
These activists were comprised of members of Taksim Solidarity and the
Taksim Gezi Park Protection and Beautification Association as well as
some unaffiliated but concerned individuals.
On
28 May, a coalition of Right to the City associations presented a
petition to Istanbul's Council to Protect Culture Heritage calling on it
protect the park. At 1:30 in the afternoon on 28 May, bulldozers
returned a second time. The protesters resisted and police used tear gas
to clear the park. One activist climbed a tree and was unable to be
dislodged, further stalling demolition. Demolition resumed and continued
until pro-Kurdish rights Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) and secularist
opposition Republican People's Party Members of Parliament Sırrı Süreyya Önder and Gülseren Onanç blockaded bulldozers. This yet again stopped demolition and a protest was called for 7pm that night. Protesters slept in the park again.
The day of 29 May was more low-key as a few hundred people came out
for protests in the park and created a festival-like atmosphere with
films and concerts. Throughout the day, activists planted seedlings in
the park as a token of resistance. Numbers swelled and 150 people slept
in the park that night as the state regrouped.
On
30 May Turkish police, unwilling to allow a major tourist hub to be
blighted in this fashion, gave the occupiers a five in the morning
wake-up call in the form of tear gas. In case the message was not clear
enough, they also set fire to occupiers' tents. With the park cleared and the state clear that it meant business, demolition resumed until at 7:50 in the morning, Önder yet again blockaded the bulldozers with his own body. After news broke on social media of the early-morning raid and concomitant police violence, people accumulated throughout the day and slept over in the park en masse.
The police tried the same tactics on the morning of 31 May, this
time with several hundred people sleeping over in the park. The raid
was more vicious than the day before and media was banned from the park.
After this, Taksim Square officially became contested territory as
police violence escalated and protesters clashed with police throughout
the day.
In
the ensuing mayhem, famed freelance Turkish journalist, Ahmet Şık was
hospitalized after being struck in the head by a teargas canister.
Onlookers claimed that Şık, who in 2011 penned a book about police
corruption in Turkey that was banned from publication, was fired on intentionally from a distance of about ten yards. Önder himself was hospitalized after also being hit by a tear gas canister.
What
likely would have blown over with no lasting impact suddenly ignited
into one of the biggest mobilizations in recent Turkish history.
Estimates during the day of 31 May put the number of protesters between
five thousand and ten thousand, and police have attempted mass arrests
of anyone occupying the park. Police forces have been making liberal use
of teargas, resulting in a flood of instantly iconic images that capture the spirit of dissent. There are in fact reports that the police have used so much tear gas that Istanbul's police force has had to ship in more from the nearby city of Bursa. On Friday, #DirenGeziParki [Resist Gezi Park] was, for most of the day, the number one worldwide trending hashtag on Twitter.
Late
in the night on 31 May, the police barricaded the park and closed all
of the roads and public transportation leading to Taksim Square. This
completed the square's transformation into a battleground as protesters
attempted—and in some instance succeeded—to
break the barricades. With news spreading that Taksim was barricaded,
and growing outrage at the media blackout, residents of Istanbul began
organizing in their own neighborhoods and marching together to Taksim.
Unverified reports on Twitter
estimated 40,000 people were on foot heading to Taksim, including
thousands crossing the Bosphorus Bridge that connects the European and
Asian sides of the city, which is normally closed to pedestrians.
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| Taksim Square seen from a bus on an ordinary day (photo Siv O'Neall) |
Solidarity
protests have spread organically to other cities, mostly as an
expression of anger at police brutality. Protesters have taken to the
streets in the cities of Ankara, Izmir, Izmit, Eskişehir, Kayseri,
Antalya, Kutahya, and no doubt others. Radikal reports
that protesters were tear gassed in Izmit and Eskişehir and dozens were
detained in other cities. At the time of writing, it appears that
numbers are only going to continue to grow and demonstrations will
continue to escalate.
The police violence has been nothing short of excessive. According to the Turkish alternative news site Bianet, at least one hundred protesters have been injured.
But this was reported during the day on 31 May and so seems like a
conservative estimate at this point, especially given the level of
violence and the use of tear gas, which is widely considered a chemical
weapon. The Turkish Radikal daily has a series of videos available putting police violence on display. According to a live blog on the leftist website Sendika [Turkish-only], police have in multiple instances blocked ambulances from accessing the injured.
The
reaction of the police prompted Emma Sinclair-Webb, senior Turkey
researcher at Human Rights Watch, to declare Friday that "the display of
extreme police violence yet again against peaceful demonstrators in the
Taksim Park spells the government and local authorities' deep
intolerance of the right to assembly and non-violent protest in Turkey
today."
Origins of the uprising
The
fact that the protests were not sponsored by a political party or
related to the Kurdish conflict has led to comparisons with Occupy Wall
Street (OWS) or even the Seattle World Trade Organization protests of
1999. OWS protesters in the United States, once inspired by tactics of
the Arab uprisings, are now expressing solidarity with Turkish
activists. Right now no party or group can claim ownership of the
movement and the only sign of coalition is the information hub, DirenGeziParki.com.
But
this protest is the latest manifestation of a movement that has been
stirring for some time now. The shopping mall is only one component of a
plan to entirely redesign Taksim Square into a more car-friendly, tourist-accommodating, and sanitized urban center. Mass protests have also taken place recently to stop the closure of the landmark Emek Cinema, located on İstiklal Avenue off Taksim Square, which is also being converted into (no surprise) a shopping mall.
Taksim
Square is the heart and soul of Istanbul. It is common sense to
Istanbulites that if a revolution is to come to Turkey, it would begin
in Taksim. Protests are regularly held in the square, and issues run the
full gamut of concerns of Turkish citizens: LGBT equality, recognition
of the Armenian Genocide, an end to the Kurdish conflict, an end to
military conscription, economic justice, and more. In 2011, there was a
massive one-day protest in support of a free and open internet that drew
upwards of thirty thousand people.
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| Protesters flood Taksim Square for the "Internetime Doukunma" ("Don't touch my internet") protest in 2011. Gezi Park can be seen in the background. Photo by Jay Cassano. |
Taksim
is also home to a massive May Day protest every year, in part a
response to the Taksim Square Massacre on May Day 1977. On 1 May,
Istanbul police violently cracked down on protesters, using over fourteen tons of water mixed with tear gas.
As evidence of the link between current protests and those of May Day,
the Confederation of Revolutionary Trade Unions (also known by the
acronym DISK, and one of the largest union blocks in Turkey) officially
called on its members to come out and support the occupation.
The
new Taksim will eliminate mass pedestrian entrances from all sides in
favor of car tunnels, making it an impractical site to protest and
congregate. In short, it will be reduced to a photo-op for tourists who
pass through for five minutes and then continue on with their tax-free
shopping.
Another key launching point was the planned
construction of a third bridge crossing over the Bosphorus in Istanbul.
Ground broke on construction of the third bridgeexpected to complete Istanbul's deforestationEcumenopolis: City Without Limits
Culture wars or economic unrest?
The
entire plan for Taksim Square’s redesign is part of an overall
neoliberal turn that Prime Minister Erdogan's Justice and Development
Party (AKP) are central to. Istanbul's city center has been undergoing a
rapid process of gentrification, especially in the historic
neighborhoods of Sulukule, Tarlabaşı, Tophane and Fener-Balat,
which housed the poor, the immigrants, the Kurds, and the Roma. The
goal of this so-called “urban renewal” is to make room for more tourist
attractions, or to—at minimum—“clean up” the neighborhoods, removing
working class urban dwellers who might scare off tourists. The idea is
that this new and improved city center will attract foreign investment
in Istanbul, which is to be further developed into a financial and
cultural hub at the crossroads of Europe and the Middle East.
Some outlets have linked the Gezi Park protests to the AKP's recent restrictions on the sale of alcohol. Journalists doing so
are attempting to portray the Gezi Park occupation as a conflict
between Erdoğan's Islamism and the country's secular ethos. The
secularist opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) has also taken
this stance, and has tried to coopt the uprising by turning the movement
into a symbol of culture wars between a secular youth and an older
Islamist generation.
Attractive
as that framing may be to Western media, it could not be further from
the truth. While many protesters are without a doubt staunch secularists
who are motivated by opposition to the AKP's increasing social
conservatism, there is no indication that this is what ultimately
brought thousands of people out into the streets. In fact, when CHP
leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, came to Gezi Park to speak, protesters sang
over him, preventing him from being heard. It is clear that the movement
thus far is about a conflict in visions for urban space between ruling
elites and the people who actually live, work, and play in the city.which took place under the banner of “Diren Istanbul
At the same time, and as the protests appear to
spread and take on a more generally anti-government tone, it is not
unlikely that general dissatisfaction with Erdoğan will eventually win
out as the primary message of the movement. In that case, we can expect
to see a rift between the liberal secularist opposition who joined the
protest on 31 May and after and the radical protesters who spawned the
movement in the first place.
Throughout the Arab uprisings, Turkey remained ostensibly stable. Some commentators proposed Turkey as a model
for post-uprising Arab states, most especially Egypt. The mixture of a
“moderate” Islamist prime minister and a "secular" constitution made
NATO-member Turkey an attractive prototype for a new Middle East in the
eyes of Western pundits. Others, along with myself, have pointed out that Turkey is a poor choice of role model, given its ongoing conflict with its Kurdish minority population as well as myriad other dynamics.
Today,
it seems as though Turkey's internal divisions are surfacing in a way
not seen for some time. What we are seeing in the Gezi Park occupation
is the sudden explosion of this Right to the City movement, with some
general anti-government sentiment mixed in. For now, an Istanbul court has temporarily suspended construction of the park,
pending a hearing on the matter. As time goes on, and if this movement
continues to grow, rifts are likely to occur and the meaning of the
protests will become as contested as the physical space of Taksim
Square. But for the time being, between the massive May Day protest and
now this nationwide movement less than a month later, we may finally be
in for a summer of uprising in Turkey.
By Jay Cassano, a freelance journalist currently living in Brooklyn. Previously based in Istanbul.
[Cihan Tekay contributed research to this story.]
Source: LINKS -- International journal of socialist renewal
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