Campaigns & Remembrances of Anna Campbell

Can you all hear me? We just hear it on the TV, everything has stopped until Friday due to the Health & Safety of the scaffolding, yeah! Thank you everybody!

Listen up, this is very, very important what I'm going to say. I was too excited a while ago, and I forgot to say what I wanted to say from my heart.

From my heart out, not just me, all the residents in Oak Lane, wish to thank the activists for everything they're out there doing for us. They’ve slept in trees, they’ve slept on the floors. Look, from our hearts, thank you very much to all of you activist out there that put yourselves out to help us. And may Jesus help you and look upon you everywhere you go. Thank you!

Did you not expect any of this?

This here? Yeah we knew this was gonna happen because we were told about it, but it's exciting to see it now. I’m so proud of them.

1 Year Anniversary Action

5, 6, 7, 8, let’s evict the racist state!

The same anti-Traveller racism that led to the elimination of many established transit pitches and the strengthening of police powers to force Travellers to move on and evict Travellers has made it impossible for Traveller families to settle. Dale Farm was not a one off.

From Rojava to Hamburg: Fight G-20

To our companions, friends and comrades,

To borrow some words from the Zapatistas:

What we learned is, that from above comes only exploitation, robbery, oppression and disdain. This means, that from above comes only pain

On the 7th and 8th of July, the representatives of this world of pain and of killing for profit and power will meet in Hamburg. The world they want to preserve is dystopic. It‘s a world of F16-Bombers and combat drones, a world of patriarchal opression, of spying and brutal exploitation.

Their world of capital, nation state and patriarchy is in a deep long lasting crisis: economically as well as politically but also concerning their ideological legitimacy. Today, fewer and fewer people believe that we live in the best of all possible worlds.

Our quest for a different world brought us to the liberated territories of the middle east – the revolution in rojava today embodies the spirit of resistance against their malicious world.. The revolution happening in Kurdistan right now is our Revolution and part of our search.

Our search for what could be possible means accepting a rich heritage: the women of the Paris Commune of 1871 and the workers militias of the Hamburg uprising of 1923 – that’s us. The comrades of the October Revolution and the Spanish War – that’s us. The workers on strike in India and the guerrilla in the mountains of Kurdistan – that’s us. We are the anarchists of Greece. We are the witches and the rebellious farmers of the early modern period and the poor in the consejos communales of Venezuela. We are squatters just as we are the Foodora and Deliveroo drivers on strike.

We who are working here in Rojava as internationalists are part of the worldwide fight of the oppressed against the reign of state, capital and patriarchy just as you are today in Hamburg.

Here in northern Syria we have the space to prove in practice that we can organize by our own power and build a better world. We take part in the different sectors of the revolution: We see education and work in the communes, cooperatives and neighborhoods; we discuss and learn, we build houses and plant trees; we take part in the self-defense of the revolution against the murderers who want to suffocate it.

The summit of the G20 is a meeting of the enemies of this revolutionary project. The actors of the capitalist world of opression meeting in Hamburg embody everything that we oppose: From Trump to Erdogan, from Merkel the the Saudis, from Putin to Macron. This is why we are very happy about the fires of resistance that you want to light in the streets of Hamburg and in the hearts of those that want to shatter their chains. The light of these fires shines AL the way to the freed cantons.

Our resistance needs a long term perspective. That includes ourselves becoming militant personalities, letting our strength grow, and learning the truth about the revolutionary struggle. This also means overcoming the culture of dominance, the traces that were left by patriarchy, a capitalist lifestyle and the mentality of the nation-state have left in us.

Rojava is a good school. Here we cannot only learn how to be an actual part of a movement and of a whole society. We teach ourselves in the arts of strengthening our unity and being diverse without falling into ideological randomness. In 1976 imprisoned comrades of the movement of 2nd of June wrote:

What has to matter for us now and today – if we do not want to dig a political mass grave for all of us– is to overcome our fragmentation and to see over the horizons of our small groups. While the left in this country is busy fighting each other, the rightwing is gathering to attack.

The protests against the G20 summit in Hamburg and the internationalist commune of Rojava are both part of the struggle to overcome this fragmentation.

The crisis of the hegemonic system produces monsters. The chaos it creates is a chaos that makes the reorganization of the ruling conditions possible. How this reorganization is going to look will be decided by the question of which force is best able to organize. Us, who as revolutionaries search for a way out, or those that give a reactionary, racist, chauvinist answer to the crisis?

If we want to be victorious we have to admit that our fight today is a fight for all or nothing. Today we wage a global struggle that will end either in liberation or in total oppression and has reached the level of a third world war. We cannot take ourselves out of this and expect or hope that others will do what we are too lazy or too afraid to do. It is the time of bravery and of decisions, the time of co-ordination and organization. It is the time of action.

We send you a ll our bravery and willpower, all our hatred fo r those that want to create a world of darkness and hopelessness. We send you all our love, you who fight with us and light the fires of resistance – in Hamburg and in Rojava.

On Internationalism & Rojava

I came to Rojava about a year ago as an internationalist.

Now, internationalism is not... coming here as an internationalist is not the same as coming as an international person.

Because internationalism is a kind of political thought.

That that means that everybody who's involved in liberation area struggles.

It's their duty to not just work for the liberation of their own people or their own area, but for everybody who's been fighting in this way.

You know, like, OK, I could be far away in my own country.

And I could say, oh, as long as I managed to free my own people, then it's enough.

But, you know, for internationalists, this is not enough.

You know, we have to.

Support everybody who's.

Fighting for to create the world that they want to live in.

And so, yeah, it's a it's a tradition that's really long and beautiful.

You know, many people from across the world throughout the last centuries have traveled to fight for each other.

And the most famous example of is, of course, the Spanish Civil War, where.

Thousands of people travel to Spain to fight against the forces of fashion.

I am and and thousands of people also died in this fight because, you know, this is the, this is one of the important points of internationalism.

It's not saying separation between your people and other people.

And of course, if you.

If you love, if you love your own people enough to fight for them and die for them, and I think you have to be to be a revolutionary, then you also love people from far away enough to fight for them and die for them.

And maybe you've never.

Even met them.

But this is the principle.

This is one of the principles of the revolution.

And so we as internationalists also take this on and you know.

And it's something not just.

As a international people that we have these values, but also the people who lived here and they're fighting for the place that they are born in it that their families have lived.

In for generations.

That they also take on.

These values you know.

There has been international shaheeds international martyrs.

There's many, many years in this place and so.

One of the.

One of the forces behind the revolution is that we build things up even stronger and even greater for.

In the memory.

Of the people that have fallen Shaheed that have become martyrs, so?

Even if there.

Were no more international people that came to rush over to fight which.

I don't think it will ever have.

Then the fight would still be continued.

In memory of those international people who have died here.

And so I think this is, this is something really beautiful for the revolution.

And you know to.

To feel like you can all fight together to create a better world.

Yeah, and it and it.

Is it is a better world here?

You know, like, OK, I haven't been here.

For a super long time.

But some but I've seen.

I've seen that.

If you really work hard and if you really have this dedication.

And belief in yourself and in the goodness of people that you can really build.

A world that is more beautiful and.

And you know for instance.

The communist system in Russia.

But this is like an example of the smallest way that we can work together, you know?

Because in the place where I come from, the state says, OK, we're going to control everything that you do.

We know what's best for you.

We know what's best for everyone.

And they do it, and they make you do it.

They force you to do it.

Otherwise they take away your house, your job, your identity, whatever, whatever they want, because the state has ultimate control.

But here.

The people who have built up the revolution say no, this is not the best way.

Each person living inside a small village or area knows what's best for them.

So this is the way that we organize.

This is the commune system.

Each small village or area in a town organizes among themselves.

They meet every two weeks.

They elect representatives.

And they decide.

They decide what they need and and they take representatives or delegations to higher councils who defied bigger things.

Of course, I can't really explain it very well in two minutes and I'm in the military structure, so I don't know it that well, but I have been to people, I have been to families.

And spoke to people and it really seems like not just a a pipe dream here, you know, something that is working and of course because it's a real revolution and not just some PhD students thesis, you know, not just some history.

But of course, yeah, there are problems and people fight and get angry with each other, but.

This is a revolution which is built up of the people that participate in it and.

And people can work these things out.

You know, like.

What was I going to say?

Yeah, like it's a revolution that can change.

It's it's not something that's just fixed and that has an ideology on it from above.

Like for instance, look at the like the people who.

Lived in area who started the revolution?

Were the Kurds right?

So when it started, the liberated area was known as Rojava.

Western Kurdistan but now their liberated areas has increased to include Manbij and errors or and Docker.

So people said OK.

Even though we've been, even though cards have been fighting for many decades for deliberation, it's not just our liberation.

It's the liberation of everyone.

So now we say it's not anymore the revolution of Rojava, it's the revolution of northern Syria and it can only grow and expand to include as many areas as needed.

And it can change in every area to give the people what they need, but at the same time retained this.

Smallness, that that.

That means that everybody voice can be heard.

And this is another really important principle of the revolution.

It's their enthusiastic and voluntary participation of as many people as possible.

Whatever part of you is important that you feel like needs to be represented, it can be represented whether you're that.

Gender, age, belief, culture, party.

You can make up a commune for this.

We can make up a representative group and you can have your voices heard in the Councils.

So it's not like, you know, you look at examples of socialism.

From the past.

And it's like everyone has to be the same again, even the same party, you know, but friends here, you know the people.

And friends, they don't want that.

They want everyone to feel like they can be as different as they need to be.

Because with the diversity comes strength.

So yeah, that's what I've seen of knowledge of our revolution, and I really get a lot of hope from it.

And I hope that other people across the world also catch.

But of course, it's not just building up something beautiful here.

It's also defending.

Ourselves from the attacks of outside, you know, like I gave the example of the Spanish Civil War well.

Friends of people are also fighting against fascism here.

You know, you have Dash and Alyssa and all of the other fascist groups that are spying up during the Syrian war and.

And it's interesting in a way, because it's like they're two completely opposite things.

You know what the what the revolution is building up.

It's a woman revolution, and it's a revolution of freedom and diversity.

And on the other hand, you have Dash, who wanted to create something where there was no dissent and no voice and everyone was the same, and indiscriminately murdering women and anybody who disagreed with them in the.

Most horrible ways.

As I'm sure you all know.

So yeah, it's rare that you get to see an example of something of two things that are so different and because friends were fighting.

For something beautiful and fighting for that on land and so hard and with so much belief, then it and then you know, friends managed to, more or less.

Get rid of dash.

As we've seen, the dyrosaur operation hasn't completely finished yet, but it is almost finished.

But of course, Dash is just one.

A symptom of a patriarchal system and of a chauvinistic and nationalistic mindset that thinks that it's OK to kill women, it's OK to select, enslave people, and kill people because of differences.

And you don't really see that here, but across the world.

And I don't know, maybe some people think, oh, there she is, almost finished, then that will be the end of the problem.

No, there's many other groups that have the same ideology.

Like I said, there's Al Nusra, who there's still a.

Lot in Jana.

Blues and many dozens of different small groups who have the same ideology.

As Josh.

And friends have fought and died in thousands so, so bravely.

But this problem isn't finished.

And and we have the example of the.

Attacks on Afrin at the moment?

By the Turkish state, who are just using these terrorists as their foot soldiers, just throwing them after him and and there exactly.

Same as you know you can.

You quick search on the Internet will show you some like videos that show that there are these, these terrorists.

They're exactly the same as dash.

Some of them are unashamedly dash soldiers.

So it's like.

The the problem hasn't finished, and now it's become even bigger.

And because it's the second biggest army of NATO is behind them.

And so.

I don't know.

I feel like this is a really important and terrifying time because friends have fought for so long.

People have fought for so long and and made so many sacrifices, and now there's a bigger enemy than ever.

The the forces of fascism are not just, you know, bearded guys with black flags, but they're also the state to states that surround the revolution.

And they are that are its enemy.

And OK, today it's the Turkish state.

BBC Report on News of Her Martyrdom

We got here and my responsible was very happy.

She's still a chicken from one of the nearby houses, got a friend to kill it and.

And then I'm going to have meat.

This is Anna Campbell on the frontlines of the war in Syria.

No one in Britain except her closest friends and family knew she was there.

This footage of her was kept in confidence until now.

A very important part of life here.

The first thing that we do is have a cup of tea, and sometimes.

Second, Anna Campbell, a qualified plumber from East Sussex, had come to join the Kurdish women armed units in Syria.

This week.

My name is Haling Caratach, running from before with Anna Campbell.

I joined the FJ in March of last year, and now I've just finished.

We've just finished this education of identity and military.

She was kind of an interesting person.

She was the kind of person that she wouldn't tip her around, you know, English being English and polite, and she was just very grounded in what she wanted.

Back home, she'd been involved in campaigning for human rights and animal welfare.

Political activism was in her DNA.

I'm I'm glad.

Both involved in like political activities and stuff.

So I guess there's that.

I think it's genetic.

Than upbringing, but she's just very uncompromising, very determined.

Yeah, no.

The Kurds say they fight for women's liberation in the Middle East.

The female fighters of the YPG have been playing a major part in the battle to defeat so-called Islamic State.

She's not held back by.

Any fears that I know of?

Even fear of death?

What was her route into this?

Everything is online nowadays.

And you can find out about the the YPG, YPG activities, you can find out about the new socio political system that's emerged.

They call it the revolution in Rojava, which is utopian and it's egalitarian.

Women have equal rights, equal representation.

It was these ideals, the feminist ideology of the Kurdish women, that had a strong appeal.

So I joined because I wanted to support the revolution and because I wanted to participate in the.

The in the revolution of women that is being go up here.

But what Anna was doing was potentially illegal.

Authorities in the UK say there is no just cause for taking up arms abroad.

Whenever she called home, she never fully told her family about the danger she was preparing to face.

We need a little bit she.

She was quite, I think, protective of us by just giving us little bits of information.

She just downplayed it so much.

She just said, you know, I'm fine.

I'm just, I'm just sitting on a lookout posts eating hummus and not really doing much and.

I'll be back soon.

She gave us the impression that she was not really involved in military action.

We later found out she was.

Anna was involved in fighting in Darrisaw.

Where the Islamic State group were holding the last of their territory.

The principles that the Kurdish women on groups stand for, anybody can see how they're very inspiring.

But is it worth taking part in violence for?

To her, it was yeah.

And because she believes it was a cause worth fighting for.

What she was doing, fighting in this capacity, would be considered against the law.

So how did her actions sit with you?

Yeah, but the law would be that.

The law is completely wrong in that respect.

I wrote to my MP, I said my daughters aren't in Syria fighting for our allies, the people who are on our side.

But then the war changed.

Turkey began to attack the Kurds along the northern Syrian border around the town of Afrin.

Because of a long and bitter history between these two sides, Turkey sees the Kurdish armed groups as terrorists.

The attacks of the Turkish state against the revolution.

And against the Kurdish people and the people of Kurdistan is.

Are very shocking and heavy.

As this new conflict broke out, many of those Anna was with went to fight against Turkey in the north, and she made-up her mind to go to.

Her commanders in the YPG refused to let her.

They said you're going to stick out like a sore thumb, you blonde haired, blue-eyed, obviously.

Foreigner, she dyed her hair black.

Didn't tell anyone that she was going we.

Would have tried.

Yeah, I would have tried to stop her, but she probably would.

Yeah, I mean.

She would have just.

Just take them there, notice.

Take no notice.

It was in Afrin, say her friends, that Anna was killed by a Turkish airstrike.

And her family were given the news.

At that moment that you know the bottom fell out of my world because I knew she was dead.

We're going through the whole gamut of despair, grief, anger.

Guilt in my case.

Do you think that parents should try to do more to stop people going to fight like Anna did?

As I say.

I know that she would never have forgiven me if I'd stopped her from going.

But I feel like I could have done more too.

Raise awareness of what was going on.

And we did try this.

In fact, when she first told me, I said, is there any way I can stop you going?

She said that there's no point in you even trying.

So that's the story.

The potential consequences of fighting in Syria are clear, but it's a risk that some continue to take.

Dozens of British citizens have joined Kurdish armed groups.

7 British men have also lost their lives.

A vigil has been held for Anna Campbell in Lewis, her hometown, as those who loved her try to come to terms with this loss.

On the frontline, these fighters became her family and their cause became her own.

I'm really excited to go and join so many brave friends that are fighting there now.

A Sister’s Eulogy

Anna, sister.

People are calling you martyr and hero.

But even before the 15th of March of 2018, you were already a hero and so many more things.

Dedicated bookworm.

Savior of insects.

Creator of Fantasy worlds.

Experience storyteller.

Defender of everlasting childhood.

Expert harmony singer.

Apprentice seamstress.

Maker of vegan birthday pancakes.

Painter of paper mache sculptures at festivals.

Master of Charity shop chic.

French linguist and damn perfusion.

Faithful writer of handwritten letters.

Beloved Auntie Anna to Cameron.

Kai Drake and Eva.

Barrier of time capsules.

Foxhunt saboteur.

Professional hitchhiker.

Master of Bizarre facial expressions.

Where are flowery headscarves?

Committed babysitter.

Supreme hugga.

Bearer of sunshine hair.

And out of this world, green, blue eyes.

Pippi Longstocking fan.

Fregon food scavenger.

Calais jungle warrior.

Defender of refugee rights.

Authentic Doc Martin wearer.

Jewelry maker.

Dale Farm, protester.

Lizard activist.

London squatter.

Official reminder of family birthdays.

Rock climbing improvisor.

Interested eater of whatever is left on the table.

Expert in living off nothing.

Barefoot dancer.

Wooden spoon. Carver.

Tell her of things as they really are.

Footage of Anna Laughing in Syria

Are you suffering a lot? Because I’m an iceberg and I can lend you some.

More Tributes

Tributes To Anna Campbell

Sources

Click - Sheffield Dance Off

Click - Eviction day Dale Farm

Click - Dale Farm Anniversary Action

Click - From Rojava to Hamburg: Fight G-20

Click - Last interview recorded with şehid Hêlîn Qerecox (Anna Campbell)

Click - Vedeng a Rojava - Episode 2

Click - In Remembrance of Şehîd Helîn Qerêçox