By Leila Shrooms for Tahrir-ICN

Omar Aziz (fondly known by friends as Abu Kamal) was born in Damascus. He returned to Syria from exile in Saudi Arabia and the United States in the early days of the Syrian revolution. An intellectual, economist, anarchist, husband and father, at the age of 63, he committed himself to the revolutionary struggle. He worked together with local activists to collect humanitarian aid and distribute it to suburbs of Damascus that were under attack by the regime. Through his writing and activity he promoted local self-governance, horizontal organization, cooperation, solidarity and mutual aid as the means by which people could emancipate themselves from the tyranny of the state. Together with comrades, Aziz founded the first local committee in Barzeh, Damascus.The example spread across Syria and with it some of the most promising and lasting examples of non-hierarchical self organization to have emerged from the countries of the Arab Spring.

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The events of the past couple of days are the latest step in a sequence of events by which the military can consolidate its hold on power, aim towards the death of the revolution and a return to a military/police state.

The authoritarian regime of the Muslim Brotherhood had to go. But what has replaced it is the true face of the military in Egypt – no less authoritarian, no less fascist and for sure more difficult to depose.

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Two and a half years after the ousting of Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian streets have spoken again. Mohamed Morsi has been ousted after a one-year reign and four days of demonstrations on an unprecedented scale in the history of the country. The Egyptians have reminded the world that an election is not a blank cheque which leaves representatives free from all constraint. Real democracy involves control over those mandated by those giving the mandate and it would be nothing without the ability to remove those who betray their mandate. No constitution gives that power to the workers (except for some “recall referendums”, à la Chavez) – the ruling classes would be too afraid of the democratic spiral that could eventually be damaging to them. Unconcerned with constitutions, the law, the supposed “democratic legitimacy” of elections, the workers in Egypt have reclaimed their destiny through collective and revolutionary mobilization. Let our little Western bosses beware, and let workers around the world take note!

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I met Mohammed Hassan Aazab earlier this year over tea at a table of young anarchists in downtown Cairo. The anniversary of the revolution had just passed with massive protests and the emergence of a Western-style black bloc that appeared to have little to do with anarchists in the city. At the time, much of the ongoing grassroots organizing was against sexual violence — in particular, the mob sexual assaults that have become synonymous with any large gathering in Tahrir. The trauma of such violence carried out against protesters was apparent in our conversation. In fact, Aazab told me that he was done with protests and politics, and had resigned himself to the dysfunction of day-to-day life in Egypt.

Then came June 30. Crowds reportedly as large as 33 million took to the streets to call for the Muslim Brotherhood to step down from power, just a year after Mohammed Morsi took office. In the pre-dawn moments of July 1, as Aazab’s phone battery dwindled steadily, I reconnected with him to chat a bit about his return to resistance.

An anarchist tent in Tahrir Square. (WNV/Mohammed Hassan Aazab)

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