Ghent: Wondelmeersen occupied

Since June 20, the summer solstice, the Wondelgemse Meersen have been occupied and declared an autonomous zone!

This nature reserve, 14ha large, is the last continuous piece of wilderness of what was once a vast swamp area in the north of Ghent.

If it were up to transport company De Lijn and politicians such as Zuhal Demir (N-VA) and Lydia Peeters (Open Vld), the Wondelmeersen would be destroyed to make way for a so-called “green” depot for buses and trams. But a “green” depot you don’t build at the expense of valuable green nature. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Squat on Rokin evicted after celebration of one year of Takland

Takland is a year older and we celebrate! With resistance in the form of squatting a new building. After a year full of action, discussion, movies and parties, this new addition to the alley will be the revolutionary art of Amsterdam again. The new squatted building (ground floor Rokin 104) on the corner of Taksteeg/Rokin had been vacant for years and has the same owner (Axel P Nielsen BV) as the already squatted Taksteeg 6.

The police didn’t want to hear anything about it, after promising at 19:00 on Friday that they will not evict, they came later in the evening at 23:30 during our festival with 10 riot cops vans, dog brigade, popo on horses and BraTra to show their teeth. An illegal eviction in Amsterdam, which has not happened since the squatting of the Waldeck Pyrmonkade in January 2022. [Read More]

Wageningen: Community and eco-squat ‘De Achtertuin’ squats a vacant lot

13 June 2024, Wageningen – Since Tuesday 11 June, Veerweg 121 has been inhabited by the community and eco-squat ‘De Achtertuin’ (The Backyard). The Wageningen group, together with dozens of activists, has squatted this new terrain to argue for a sustainable and socially just living model. This action is a direct response to the ongoing housing crisis, environmental crisis and growing social inequality in the Netherlands.

Squatting is legit

The squatted lot has been vacant for at least 17 years and is currently owned by a property developer. In the latest plans, which have not been approved, a construction project of expensive owner-occupied homes was proposed. To this day, there are still no concrete and accepted plans for the site. The activists therefore consider it justified to establish their right of residence on this vacant lot. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Achter Oosteinde 16 squatted. Opening of the Shadia Abu Ghazaleh campus

Pro-Palestinian protesters open Shadia Abu Ghazaleh Campus of the People’s Free University. Around 14:45, pro-Palestinian demonstrators marched from the Spui to Achter Oosteinde 14 and opened the Shadia Abu Ghazaleh Campus of the people’s Free university in a squatted building.
Today, on May 25, pro-Palestinian demonstrators began their protest on the Spui at 14:00. This demonstration moved through the streets of Amsterdam to Achter Oosteinde 16, where the protesters revealed that a squatted building is being opened to the public as the first campus of the People’s Free University. The Shadia Abu Ghazaleh Campus will be a space of resistance where people can learn from each other and teach each other. The campus is named after one of the first Palestinian women to participate in armed resistance in 1967: “She knew the importance of knowledge and education in the struggle for liberation. […] We will create this space in her legacy,” the protesters say. [Read More]

Utrecht: Biltstraat 31 squatted and evicted

This year’s demo Rave voor de Rafelranden took place on 11 May. The building on the Biltstraat was squatted for the demo. The same night, the police evicted the squat and arrested 5 people.

On Saturday afternoon it was announced that the building at Biltstraat 31 in Utrecht has been squatted. The old hotel has been vacant since 2020 and is waiting for new permits that have been refused by the municipality. The squatters have chosen to announce the action today, as they drew attention to the frayed edges of the city today by means of a street rave through the center. With this action, the squatters would like to add a cultural space to the city. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Building squatted for Housing Day. Gravenstraat 26 resquatted

NO HOUSING NO KING

Today, April 27, we come together to celebrate Housing Day (Woningsdag), not Koningsdag (King’s Day). Instead of celebrating the monarchy, we will celebrate the resistance and bravery of everyday people. Kingsday is a day of hypocrisy, where we wear orange plastic crowns to pretend we are a king, while every other day we are struggling to make ends meet. While the royal family bathes in luxury we are struggling to pay for basic necessities like food, energy and housing. Nationalism and the celebrations of the monarchy we see today, work to create false divisions that do not serve us. It draws artificial borders over land and divides us, it breaks the natural tendency of solidarity between people and instead teaches us we should fear one another. [Read More]

London: “Why we squatted Gordon Ramsay’s pub”

chairs and tables inside squat

Freedom News received this statement from the Camden Art Cafe squatters who have liberated Gordon Ramsay’s York and Albany Hotel restaurant in Camden, London:

We are occupying the York and Albany Hotel in Camden as the collective Camden Art Cafe. We aim to open our doors regularly to anyone and everyone, particularly the people of Camden who have been victims of gentrification and parasitic projects like HS2 [squat!net Stop HS2 archives]. We provide free food, drinks, and a space to display their art without the ridiculous red-tape galleries that require people to jump over. We believe all of us and our art deserves dignity.
[Read More]

Amsterdam: Mokum Kraakt squats former windows in the Red Light District

Mokum Kraakt squats on the Dollebegijnensteeg in the Red Light District in solidarity with the sex workers and against the arrival of the erotic center. During a protest against the planned erotic centre, squatting collective Mokum Kraakt announced it has squatted a number of former sex work windows in De Wallen, Amsterdam’s red light district.

The squatters say the windows were squatted in solidarity with sex workers who fight against plans for an erotic centre on the outskirts of the city. Sex work has been a part of De Wallen for over 400 years and sex workers have clearly and repeatedly said they want to stay in the city centre. The people living close to the location of the prospective location of the erotic centre are also against it. And still, mayor Halsema is pushing through her plans. [Read More]

Amsterdam: two buildings squatted next to Nieuwmarkt

We squatted two buildings in light of the Housing Crisis, International Day against Sexist and Sexual Violence, in solidarity with our Palestinian comrades, and we express our anger about fascism taking over the Netherlands.

We revealed two squatted buildings on 22 November, at Krom Boomssloot 45 and 47, in light of the need for housing for our comrades and our sisters.

In light of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on the 25th of November, it is crucial and a priority to open housing where women can feel safer, where we can find each other and grow our resistance together. [Read More]

Amsterdam: two houses owned by Blackstone squatted during the ADEV demo

No free spaces without a free Palestine

Amsterdam, October 21st – We have squatted these 2 buildings (Prinsengracht 804 et 806), despite the city’s (and the police’s) best attempts to make it very difficult, because we believe that ADEV(Amsterdam Danst Ergens Voor – Amsterdam dances for something)’s call to ‘disown stupid property’ is a call to action.

These buildings, owned and left empty by a massive american investment firm called Blackstone, some (though not all) of whose crimes you can read on the banner, are definitely, by all definitions, stupid property. But we want to stress that, in a capitalist system that puts corporate giants over human life and dignity, ALL PROPERTY IS STUPID AND ALL PROPERTY IS THEFT. [Read More]

Berlin (Germany): Barricades and stones for the anniversary of Liebig34 eviction

Housing is not a commodity! Two apartments in the Liebig14 expropriated

“We will not surrender. And even if they drag us out of our homes. We will return. And we will take back what is taken from us.”
Words from the Liebig34 on October 9, 2020, at 04:00 am.

Exactly three years ago today, on October 9, 2020, the anarcha queer feminist project Liebig34 was evicted. More than twelve years ago, on February 2, 2011, the house project Liebig14 was evicted. The evictions were attacks on our struggles to shape our lives and places of living in a self-determined way and from below. They were attacks on our collective organizing against sexist violence and capitalist patriarchy.

Exactly today, on October 9, 2023, we expropriated two vacant apartments in Liebig14. We declare them common property of the neighborhood. [Read More]

Amsterdam: Time Travelers Hotel, new squat on Rokin 108

Time travelers arrived a couple months in Amsterdam to usher in a new era of activism and change. They have been publishing newspapers, running amok, and resurrecting the inherited tradition of the Hi-Ha Happenings originally started by the Provos in the sixties. After the success of the first Happening, during which the structure that eats away at the lives of ordinary folk was denounced and partially dismantled through ritual and magic, a second Hi-Ha Happening took place on the 29th of September.

This Happening was a constructive one, in counterpart to it’s destructive predecessor. This came to a climax when at the end of the Happening a new squat was announced: the Time Travelers Hotel. The following statement was made during the revealing, and is thus made public for all those who experience a like minded sense of time-dysmorphia, unrest, urge for change, and willingness to provoke and be provoked. [Read More]