NEW YORK (MintPress) — For the first month of 2012, it seemed that the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement, which began in New York City in the fall as a protest against corporate excess and economic inequality, was losing momentum. After weeks of staying out of the headlines, though, the Occupiers are front and center again after the detention of more than 400 people in at least five cities in the past two days alone.
And today in the nation’s capital, Occupy DC protesters are standing up to a ban by the U.S. National Park Service on sleeping in McPherson Square and Freedom Plaza, where they have been camping out since October. The Park Service ordered Occupy DC to clear away sleeping bags and pillows —saying they could keep their tents as a symbol of protest if the flaps stayed open — and threatened to enforce the ban at noon.
But that didn’t stop the demonstrators from creating a 30 foot “Tent of Dreams” around the statue at the center of McPherson Square, referring to their slogan of “Let Us Sleep So We Can Dream.” Some were blatantly defying the order by taking a nap inside a clear tent made by local artists.
The Park Police commanding officer made a statement saying that there is no deadline for police action and enforcement will be ongoing. He said the police would be back “when all of this is over,” apparently referring to the media circus in the park. Protesters responded by shouting “You work for us, you work for the people! We’ll call you when we need you!” and “Evict corruption, not people protesting it!”
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A weekend of violence
The furor began on Saturday in California when Occupy Oakland, where only a handful of people had been participating in occasional weekend marches, came back with a bang. Fresh protests broke out just days after the group said it planned to convert a vacant building into a community center and threatened to try to shut down the port, occupy the airport and take over City Hall.
As the crowd swelled throughout the day, there were increasing street clashes. Demonstrators threw rocks and bottles at police officers, who used smoke, tear gas and bean bag rounds to disperse them. At one point, a group of protesters broke into City Hall, spray-painting the walls with graffiti, damaging property, and burning an American flag. More than 400 people were arrested on charges ranging from failure to disperse to vandalism, and at least three officers and one protester were injured.
Both sides blamed the other. Oakland Mayor Jean Quan condemned Occupy Oakland’s tactics as “a constant provocation of the police with a lot of violence toward them, “ and said the ongoing demonstrations have cost the city about $5 million. A posting on Occupy Oakland’s website said “The police actions tonight cost the city of Oakland hundreds of thousands of dollars, and they repeatedly violated their own crowd control guidelines and protesters civil rights.”
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Solidarity Sunday
The Occupy movement came out in full support of the Oakland protesters the next day, with marches in cities across the country, from Los Angeles to New York, where the original OWS protesters were evicted from their home base of Zuccotti Park in the Financial District on November 15.
The demonstration began around 7 p.m. at a park in New York’s Greenwich Village, where hundreds of people gathered, beating drums and waving flags, before one man announced “We’re going to get the backs of our brothers and sisters in the Bay Area. Let’s march.”
A few hours later they reached an empty former school building that had housed the Charas/El Bohio Cultural and Community Center before a developer bought it at a city auction. “This was once a vibrant community center,” said a male protester, “The people in Oakland wanted to create a community center.”
After weeks of relative calm in New York, there were once again clashes with police. Marchers allegedly threw bottles at the officers at least twice, leading them to storm the crowd. 12 people were reportedly arrested; most were charged with disorderly conduct, but police said three of them were charged with assault and one with criminal weapons possession.
Chris Ernesto of OccupyArrests.com, which keeps a running total of the number of Occupy protesters arrested around the U.S., tells MintPress the supposed New York detentions have not yet been included on the site. “At this point, there are inconsistencies in the reports of what happened. It doesn’t look like it’s been nailed down yet,” he says. “It’s being ferreted out right now.”
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City of Brotherly Love
A couple hundred members of Occupy Philadelphia also gathered on Sunday night to show solidarity with their Oakland brethren. Occupy Philadelphia had set up an encampment at a City Hall construction site in October but the group was kicked out in an early morning raid on November 30. The city booted the protesters from the area to make way for a $50 million renovation project that was scheduled to break ground today.
The protesters convened at City Hall again on Sunday before making their way in a circle through the city. Tensions were high as many chided police officers and chanted “We stand with Oakland.” Police later arrested two people after demonstrators knocked down a fence at the site from which they were evicted.
According to OccupyArrests.com, there have been more than 6,436 arrests in 110 different cities since Occupy Wall Street began on September 17, 2011. That number is likely to grow in the days ahead.
Source: MintPress
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