Deniz Adalı
29th March, 2025
Resistance is a serious matter
The resistance that started on 19 March 2025 is to be transformed into a new form by the Republican People’s Party (CHP), according to the agreements between CHP and the Palace (state). CHP wants to gather the reaction and anger under its own flag, but to extinguish it step by step. The extinguishing of anger and resistance is shaped according to the agreements between the CHP and the Palace.
1
Özel clearly let it slip out. Addressing the Palace, he said, ‘You are not keeping your promises’. And at the present stage, CHP has ended the protests outside of Saraçhane. In exchange for not appointing a trustee, CHP made a deal with the Palace, and the Palace (the state) wanted the protests to be extinguished. And in order to fulfil this, Özgür Özel and the CHP administration (a) suspended the protests for a few days and (b) moved the protests to the Maltepe coastal square. The aim of both is to appease the anger.
The resistance that started on 19 March 2025 seems to have started because of İmamoğlu’s arrest. But this is not true, it is incomplete. Imamoğlu’s arrest was the last straw. For this reason, the resisters openly say that the issue is not only Imamoğlu.
The resistance is again a spontaneous explosion.
It is the student movement that enables the resistance to grow. And in this respect, the students’ breaking through the barricade at the Istanbul University (IU) is of great value. The resistance has risen with the masses, who have been constantly finding barricades against them since Gezi, overcoming the police barricade, and has overflowed into the streets.
The main reason of the resistance is the practices of the Palace Regime and the prevailing feeling among the masses is that they do not want to live in this way. There is no consciousness about how they want to live, but there is a feeling that they do not want to live like this.
This is why the IU students who broke through the barricade made the masses say ‘this is possible’. This is the main reason for overflowing into the streets.
2
It is not right to compare this resistance with the Gezi Resistance. Of course, it can be compared as a social explosion. But it is not right to assume that the Gezi Resistance will be repeated, to treat it in such a way, to compare it in such a way.
In essence, the Gezi Resistance was also about saying ‘I don’t want to live like this’. But the main characteristic of the Gezi Resistance is breaking through the wall of fear and being a mass reckoning with 12 September. The 19 March resistance will, of course, bear the traces of the Gezi Resistance. It emerged after it. It developed 12 years after Gezi. During these 12 years, the Gezi Resistance could not be halted and continued to be the fearful dream of the ruling regime, the Palace Regime. For 12 years, in order to crush the effects of the Gezi Resistance, the sovereign developed what is called the Palace Regime, the extraordinary state organisation. Today’s Palace Regime was developed to put an end to the resistance, including the Gezi Resistance and the Kurdish resistance. The Palace Regime is therefore an organisation of counter-revolution. Of course, the ongoing international war of division also has a great influence on the organisation of the Palace Regime.
The Gezi Resistance was repelled by the sovereign. The revolutionary socialists could not carry the Gezi Resistance further, which was already a spontaneous resistance due to its character. This is connected with the weakness in the organisation of revolutionary socialists and revolutionary workers.
The sovereign intensified its attacks after Gezi.
For 12 years, in every action, even in the smallest one, even in a press statement held by 20 people, the Palace Regime, the Turkish state, stood against the masses with its batons, shields, gas, pepper, court. It attacked every action. Nevertheless, the resistance continued and developed in different ways, in different sizes. Within the working class, the resistance found a space and became widespread with the effect of the increasing crisis after the pandemic. In short, on the path paved by the Gezi Resistance, resistances have continued in local areas and in small sizes. Therefore, this 12-year persistence is valuable and keeps the masses dynamic. Of course, the masses participating in the protests.
In order to prevent the ongoing process, the Palace Regime did not only attack, it did not only put into effect the policy of oppression and violence. It did not only respond with arrests, barricades and imprisonments. At the same time, at the hands of CHP, it also endeavoured to direct the process and keep the masses at home. During this period, CHP, along with İnce and Kılıçdaroğlu, was tasked with ‘taming’ the resistance, keeping it within the boundaries of the system, and even carrying out the politics of confining anger at home.
On 19 March 2025, IU students actually reversed this attack by breaking down the barricade.
This is the importance of the resistance that started with 19 March 2025.
The Resistance differs from the Gezi Resistance in many ways. Where it excels is precisely this breaking down of the barricades, and here is what connects it to the Gezi Resistance. Here, breaking down the barricade is in fact a political action. Meaning, it is an action directly against the power. In the resistance, the prevailing factor is not the desire of the masses to stay in a certain area. In fact, the masses did not act in connection with İmamoğlu at the very first moment. Going to Saraçhane, in reality, includes a resistance against the trustee policy and, if necessary, the instinct to occupy the municipality and not to hand it over to the trustee. Even if this does not exist at the level of consciousness, it does exist and the CHP was constantly engaged in controlling the Saraçhane IBB building. In other words, CHP was both encouraged by the resistance of this mass, but also afraid of it.
However, the resistance of 19 March did not reach the extent of Gezi, even though it had not yet ended. Moreover, it does not reveal the traces of an alternative life. On the contrary, the attitude of ‘we don’t want to live like this’ is at the forefront. This is of course important. It would be wrong to expect a Gezi in every protest, and it would also be wrong to regret that a protest did not reach the scale of Gezi. This eliminates the opportunity to evaluate what is happening correctly.
Unlike the Gezi Resistance, the 19 March resistance burst out with more political demands. And yet, it has become manageable by CHP, mainly Imamoğlu and Özel. In the Gezi Resistance, there was no control of the bourgeois front, and in this respect, 19 March falls behind Gezi.
3
The 19 March resistance is not a CHP resistance. It is a mistake to treat it as such.
Today’s CHP administration wants to take control of the protests and by announcing the protest location as Maltepe on Wednesday 26 March, it has taken a step in this respect and increased its control over the protest.
But the resistance of 19 March is the resistance of the masses ‘we don’t want to live like this’. With the resistance of the students, the resistance has exceeded the CHP. The new administration of the CHP showed greater ‘cohesion’ than the previous administration in terms of keeping the process under control. İmamoğlu declared he is going to resist, Özgür Özel expressed himself in more left-wing terms in line with the tendencies of the masses gathered on this road. In this way, he tried to find a way to connect with the masses. But immediately afterwards, to the extent that this connection was established, he started to act in accordance with the ‘order’ to control the protests with his own character.
Today, the Palace threatens Özgür Özel with the ‘biggest radish of all’. Probably this radish is a video. It is a tradition to use sexually explicit videos in the bourgeois front. Özgür Özel is stating ‘you are not honoring the agreements’. In fact, no power or person within the bourgeois front abides by agreements. However, there is always a silence about ‘state secrets’. We do not know what Erdoğan refers to as ‘the biggest radish of all’, but we may assume that this threat shows that the bargaining is continuing.
If the Palace Regime can manage to control the process and the resistance of the masses through the hands of CHP, which is the case as of 29 March 2025, then it will launch its attacks. It is certain that a bargain with CHP is going on and will go on in this regard.
CHP seems to have made an action programme. It appears to be Imamoğlu’s plan.
– A meeting every Wednesday in a district of Istanbul
– A meeting in one city every weekend
– To collect 27.7 million signatures for İmamoğlu during these meetings (I presume the target is 60 per cent of the votes).
In reality, this programme of the CHP is a message to the Western capitals, to the USA, England, Germany and France, in other words to the masters, in other words to NATO saying ‘’Look, the Erdoğan era is over, no one will believe you even if you cheat in the elections, so give us the job‘’.
This is also the goal of CHP. And the Western capitals did not announce their messages of support for CHP until 26 March 2025.
The USA and NATO have set the Middle East tasks in front of the Palace Regime. This process is also being handled from this point of view. The position of the Palace Regime in Syria is important for NATO and the USA. That is why the USA sees no harm in continuing its Middle East plans with Erdogan. On the contrary, it wants to strengthen its hand in this regard. For the USA, it is a priority to ensure that the Turkish state plays a role in the war against Iran due to its relations with HTS and ties with the FSA. Therefore, the USA will want to continue its policy of ‘war inside and outside’. Therefore, there is no doubt that the Palace Regime’s policy of ‘strengthening the internal front’ is supported by the USA masters. However, ‘strengthening the internal front’, the bourgeois front giving a single voice and waging war in this way does not seem that easy. Here lies the importance of this resistance. The political dimension of the resistance is right here. That is, it is an obstacle against the Palace Regime’s policy of strengthening the internal front.
4
The spirit that existed at the beginning of the 19 March resistance and the situation that emerged after the masses rushed to the fields differ here, as in every protest.
The resistance on 19 March starting with IU, followed by the Middle East Technical University (METU), in which large masses of students participated, was an expression of anger against the bourgeois order, including the Palace Regime. The Palace Regime emerges as a tyranny in every aspect, and the Turkish state, with the explanations it invents for its policies of massacre and violence, the crisis, etc., is actually mocking the intelligence of the people, the masses, and humiliating the masses in every way and by every means. A reason has arisen to call ‘Enough is enough’ to all this, and the annulment of Imamoğlu’s diploma and his arrest has been a drop that overflowed the cup.
That is why the students were, in fact, at first inclined to take further action. But they did not know where to head. In Istanbul, Saraçhane developed spontaneously as a tendency for occupation against the trusteeship and for the protection of IBB. In Ankara, METU and Hacettepe mobilised separately, but no clear central square appeared. When the masses started to flow to Kızılay in Ankara, the importance of different squares came to the fore at the same time. In Izmir, when the students mobilized, they found the opportunity to meet with large masses in the main centers of the city more quickly. A state of conflict surrounded all the cities and a serious barricade resistance developed.
In reality, CHP has been much more advantageous in Istanbul than in other provinces in gathering the masses on its own front and under its control. One reason is Imamoğlu and the possibility of a trustee being appointed to IBB. This situation paved the way for the masses to flow to Saraçhane.
In Saraçhane, a strange scene unfolded. While Özgür Özel wanted to control those masses, he gradually lost momentum and started using leftist slogans. The struggle against fascism, not a rally but a protest, actually bears the traces of the interventions made to Özgür Özel from the field. Özgür Özel even promised for Taksim on May 1st. It was only a few days later that CHP figured out what to do about the masses.
It is understood that the bourgeois front held a meeting here. It must have been due to this meeting that Özgür Özel arrived at the site quite late.
From that moment on, two aspects became apparent in order to ensure the CHP’s rule in the field.
– First, Özgür Özel started to call for “no provocations”. And this lasted for a day.
It is a proof of the CHP leadership’s lack of shame. The warning of “provocation” came from the Palace, and of course Özgür Özel knows what it means to be afraid, in other words, it is as if he has not left his fear at home. Talking about provocation and claiming that some groups are creating provocations is possible only if one does not live in this country, only if one looks from the Palace.
As a matter of fact, the CHP Provincial Chairman could not help saying in the following days, “the children did nothing, the police sprayed gas, enough is enough”.
Let us look at the history of social struggle in our country.
When has the left ever provoked a demonstration? Never. Revolutionaries avoid taking steps that would put the masses at risk. This has always been the case.
On the contrary, the sovereign, the Turkish state has always attacked.
What happened in Suruç? The massacre of the state.
What was at the Ankara Central Railway Station? The massacre of the state. Or is the dancing of halay in front of the station in Ankara a provocation?
What happened on May 1, 1977?
In this country, if the police are present at a demonstration, blood may be involved. Therefore, to talk about provocations by leftist groups, if not stupidity, is to knowingly serve the Palace, to knowingly be part of the Palace media, to knowingly lie.
Now let us ask: What kind of provocation did İmamoğlu commit so that the state attacked him and annulled his diploma? If İmamoğlu had pledged allegiance to Erdoğan, he could have kept his diploma and would not have created a provocation. Right?
Is shouting a slogan a provocation?
Wouldn’t raising your voice, asking questions be a provocation? For example, had Özgür Özel said “Mr. thief, Mr. murderer” to Erdoğan in front of everyone, instead of saying “hello my President” and hugging his hand, would that be a provocation?
When the police beat up young people and workers, is a person who throws a punch at the police is committing a provocation? Is it a provocation to stand against the police who say you cannot enter your school, you cannot leave your school?
Is it not provocation to use batons, TOMAs and gas against people who take to the streets to exercise their constitutional right to demonstrate and march, but is it provocation to resist their gas, batons and TOMAs? Does a young person dancing against the TOMA spraying water provoke the police? What should we do, Mr. Özgür Özel, is breathing a provocation?
Özel must take these words back; he must apologize to the masses, to the masses at every aspect.
– The second intervention of the Turkish state is mobilizing 16 young people affiliated with the Zafer Partisi (Victory Party) to shout immoral slogans in order to remove revolutionary groups from the area, while it was intended for the CHP to take control of the masses and the protests. Of course, if this group is expelled from the field, then there would have been an incident. From this example, Özgür Özel can understand how vigilant revolutionaries are about provocations. But this hideous action, this hideous attitude, was actually put into practice in order to drive the morale and energy of the revolutionary movement, including the DEM, away from the field. And Özgür Özel watched this with great pleasure. Because after all, he thinks that he will get the votes of the “nationalist democrats”.
CHP has always wanted to get votes by becoming more and more like the AK Party, by declaring that it considers the people of this country to be “right-wing”. In fact, this policy is a way of pushing the masses to the right, of growing “right-wingism”. CHP is one of the architects of this. And now, in the protests that started on March 19, 2025, it is deploying the gangs of the Victory Party. They have no shame. Is it politics to make 16 young people, who knows how many of them were paid, swear? But this is a political maneuver to keep both the mass of the DEM Party and us revolutionaries away from the fields. And this situation was ultimately condoned by Özgür Özel and the CHP.
5
On March 19, 2025, the resistance that emerged when the barricade at IU was overcome revealed two different tendencies, especially in Istanbul and Ankara. While the CHP tried to bring the masses under its control through Saraçhane, which the Palace helped them do, at the same time, a different pursuit arose among the masses, and this is valuable.
The gatherings in Beşiktaş, Maçka Park and Galata Bridge in Istanbul are in fact a reaction to the rallies in Saraçhane which sought to appease the anger of the masses. However, these searches remained directionless and leaderless. Revolutionary students were unable to lead the masses in these squares. Which is an expression of the inadequate organization of the revolutionary movement, the revolutionary student movement. The resistance and boycott that emerged in Boğaziçi, ITU, YTU and IU is actually a step forward. The students have not been able to gather in a different way, to form a different center under the leadership of the revolutionary student movement.
Nevertheless, this dual situation is particularly important in Istanbul. CHP, with its great advantages, wanted to keep the masses under its control and since it was worried that it would be successful in this regard, it canceled the demonstrations on March 26th and dispersed Saraçhane. The revolutionary movements, which did not want to leave Saraçhane, had difficulties in establishing leadership in areas outside Saraçhane. Of course, this is a matter of power. But the existence of other squares, another path is important.
6
Today, the protests, the protesters must have clear demands.
1- All those detained, all those detained and arrested since March 19, 2025, must be released unconditionally. Özel is afraid of even voicing this demand.
These detained and arrested people, young people, women, men, cannot be accused of anything. Their fingerprints must be wiped off.
2- An investigation must be launched against those who used kicks, punches, gas, rubber bullets against the masses and those who gave these orders. This investigation must include the Interior Minister, provincial police chiefs and governors.
3- In all municipalities where trustees have been appointed, the trustee practice must be terminated. In these municipalities, new mayors must be elected within the municipal council or the mayors must be released.
4- The rectors of Boğaziçi, Istanbul University and METU should resign, and investigations should be launched against them for using violence against students, acting outside their academic duties, and cooperating with the police. The rectors of these three universities must leave their offices immediately. Their resignation would bring them a shred of honor. Starting with these three universities, rectors in all universities and deans in faculties should take office through elections.
It appears that in order to get its candidate elected, CHP wants to reach a number of signatures that will convince Western capitals, the USA, Germany, England and France not to support Erdogan. This is their way.
CHP will therefore try to keep the protests in a certain pattern.
They will neither call for a strike nor a boycott.
But resistance is a serious business.
When looking at those who resist with a beautiful and smiling face, do not think that resistance is a joke. The smile reflected in those eyes, in those faces, is the teachability of resistance, the light of seeing the future, the hope and courage of the people you resist with.
Resistance is a serious business.
Therefore, it should not be taken lightly.
The Palace Regime will, of course, attack even more.
To repel these attacks and moreover to overthrow the Palace Regime can only be achieved by organizing and developing resistance.
The student movement must be organized on a revolutionary course. This will take a long time. It is necessary to organize calmly but quickly, with intelligence and continuously. A broad, political organization should be the main course of revolutionary students.
But it is also necessary to include the labor movement that is going on all over the country.
The trade unionists, who treat resistance as some kind of farce and workers as some kind of retarded people, must now use the weapon called the strike.
Özgür Özel highlights the boycott of brands by invoking the “power that comes from consumption”. That’s it, this is what to be expected from CHP. We should still say bravo. But will we, the workers, the unionists, who know that the real power comes from production, will they be content with tweeting?
Of course this is not acceptable.
DISK has taken and is taking a very backward position in this regard. Trade unionists take workers and laborers to be mentally retarded and make fun of our minds.
As a protest, DISK has called for a standing demonstration on Friday, March 28, at 12.00 pm sharp. It is funny. DISK should take the word “revolutionary” out of its name. What kind of a funny labor union is that? Does a trade union confederation with a history of struggle like DİSK, when the country is rising up, when the resistance is developing, when workers’ strikes are already going on all over the country, find “stand up at 12.00 on Friday” as an action?
This is what is funny.
DİSK should call for a general strike on, say, this day, or on a designated day, or on two days, or on three days.
The Palace Regime knows that it is waging a civil war.
With this consciousness, for instance, it attacks the masses, imprisons them, and at the same time, through various means, wants to transfer the leadership of the resistance to its own extensions.
The Palace Regime knows that it is waging a civil war. That is why, for example, it is extending the Eid holiday to 9 days so that the protests will be less intense. For 9 days it wants the universities to be closed. For 9 days, for example, it wants the stock exchange to be closed. This is a state of civil war. This is what a 9-day holiday means.
If so, on April 9-10-11, for example, DISK should make a call and take to the streets with a call for a general strike.
It is not trade unionism to declare a women’s strike on March 8 and then, while the masses are demonstrating on March 8, lock yourself in a shopping mall during the opening ceremony of the municipality.
Trade unionism, workers’ trade unionism, is to respond to the slogan “general strike, general resistance” that is rising from everywhere today.
This call should be first and foremost made by DISK. DISK can take this call to other confederations. But it must not hold back from this call. DISK cannot function as a trade unionist by waiting for an order from the CHP or the state.
If this call is not made by DISK, then it should be made by the trade union platform, especially in Istanbul. Trade union platforms should be established in Istanbul, Izmir and Ankara, and they should jointly call for a general strike, regardless of union confederation.
Resistance is a serious business. It quickly distinguishes between those who resist and those who do not.
To organize resistance,
Come on revolutionary workers, to the United Labor Front!
Come on, resisting students, to the revolutionary lines, to the student lines of the Kaldıraç Movement.
Come on, organize in the Kaldıraç Movement, on the revolutionary course of the working class.
