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19-586: The Gdeim Izik protest camp (also spelled Gdayam Izik ) was a protest camp in Western Sahara , established on 9 October 2010 and lasting into November that year, with related incidents occurring in the aftermath of its dismantlement on 8 November. The primary focus of the protests was against "ongoing discrimination, poverty and human rights abuses against local citizens". While protests were initially peaceful, they were later marked by clashes between Sahrawi civilians and Moroccan security forces. Some referred to

38-781: A contemporary form of protest can be linked back to the US civil rights movement of the 1960s and, specifically, "Resurrection City", a protest camp held in May 1968 in Washington, D.C. as part of the Poor People's Campaign . In the United Kingdom publicity around the 1982 Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp in England put protest camps in the public imagination. Since then the practice of protest camping has and continues to be used by many social movements around

57-525: A result, 14-year-old Nayem Elgarhi died and other passengers were injured. According to the Moroccan Interior ministry, a bullet was fired from the vehicle forcing the security forces to return fire, with a final toll of one dead and three injured. However, according to the Polisario front, there were no weapons in the vehicle. According to SADR 's Occupied Territories and Communities Abroad Ministry, while

76-559: The King of Morocco and support Morocco's claim on Western Sahara. Khalili Erguibi , the father of the late Polisario Front leader and SADR president, Mohamed Abdelaziz was a member of CORCAS until his death in 2017. The president of CORCAS, Khalihenna Ould-Errachid , founded the Partido de Unión Nacional Saharaui (PUNS) in 1974, the party supported the Spanish colonization of Spanish Sahara . After

95-688: The United Nations, where Western Sahara is discussed. Most notably, Ould-Errachid has met with the President of the People's Republic of China , Hu Jintao . In an interview with the independent Moroccan weekly magazine Le Journal Hebdomadaire , the ex-chairman of CORCAS' Human Rights Commission and head of the Association of Sahrawi Victims of Repression in the Tindouf Camps, El Houcine Baïda , criticized

114-472: The camp. The protesters, some waving SADR 's flag, were joined by the residents of the camp who were reaching the city in attacking government buildings, banks, cars and shops, and clashing with the police forces. In the afternoon, with the return of the forces deployed in Gdeim Izik, pro-Moroccan protesters demonstrated in the city. According to Moroccan authorities, the dismantlement of the Gdeim Izik camp and

133-417: The civilians on the camp were deployed "as human shields ". Confronting them was a group of young protesters that used stones, knives and propane tanks. The riots later expanded to El Aaiun and other towns like Smara and El Marsa . In El Aaiun, protesters took to the streets in the morning, as there were no communications with the protest camp and they had no information about their relatives and friends in

152-582: The departure of the Spanish in 1975 and the disbanding of the PUNS, Ould-Errachid pledged allegiance to the king of Morocco at the time, Hassan II and helped organize the Green March , he is an active defender of Morocco's claim over Western Sahara. Members of CORCAS are regularly featured in the Moroccan press. The president of CORCAS, Khalihenna Ould-Errachid, regularly attends meetings in international forums, such as

171-412: The enactment of protest camp infrastructures (such as communal kitchens, child care, environmentally friendly composting toilet or use of grey water systems) or through the modes of organising and governance (e.g. direct democracy). Camping on and/or occupying land has a long history which can be traced back to nomadic cultures as well as the 17th century Diggers . However, the use of protest camps as

190-408: The first week of November, the Gdeim Izik protest camp's population was estimated at around 5,000. The primary objective of the camp was to protest against "ongoing discrimination, poverty and human rights abuses against local citizens", but later some protesters also demanded independence for Western Sahara . On 24 October, a vehicle trying to enter the camp was fired upon by Moroccan Army forces. As

209-566: The lack of tackling human rights issues, and about the manner which Ould-Errachid runs the Council. In his opinion, the country's actions in the Western Sahara were alienating Sahrawis, and thus could push more youth towards what he defined as separatism. He further claimed that most of the organization's members had no knowledge of the government's autonomy plan - that they were supposedly responsible for drafting - and that president Ould-Errachid runs

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228-511: The night of 9 October 2010, when a group of Sahrawis erected the protest camp 12 km. south-east of El Aaiún , the administrative capital of the Moroccan-administered Southern Provinces in the disputed territory. The number of protesters increased rapidly in the first weeks from a few hundred khaimas (traditional tents) to several thousand coming from other towns of Western Sahara and southern Morocco . By

247-564: The posterior protests resulted in 11 deaths and 159 wounded among the security forces and 2 civilian deaths among protesters (one of them, Babi Hamadi Buyema, who was carrying Spanish citizenship, was reported dead after being repeatedly run-over by a police car). According to the Polisario Front , 36 Sahrawis were killed, 723 wounded, and 163 were arrested. On 26 November, Mohammed VI made several changes of walis (civil governors), including Mohamed Jelmouss . The former wali of El Aaiún

266-435: The protest camp. Protest camp A protest camp or protest encampment (or just encampment ) is a physical camp that is set up by activists , to either provide a base for protest , or to delay, obstruct or prevent the focus of their protest by physically blocking it with the camp. A protest camp may also have a symbolic or reproductive component where 'protest campers' try and recreate their desired worlds through

285-683: The protests as the Third Sahrawi Intifada , following the First and the Second Sahrawi Intifadas . Political activist Noam Chomsky has suggested that the month-long protest encampment at Gdeim Izik constituted the start of the Arab Spring , while most sources consider the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi in Tunisia on 17 December 2010 to be the actual start. The protest started on

304-615: The town affirm that 36 had been treated at the Smara regional hospital. A group of mainly young Sahrawis were arrested after the protests and were accused of the murder of the 11 Moroccan auxiliary Forces killed before the dismantlement of the camp. They were tried in a military court and 25 of them received heavy jail sentences. Some reported being tortured by the Moroccan DST. Poets Hadjatu Aliat Swelm and Hossein Moulud have written about life at

323-605: The world. This activism -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . CORCAS The CORCAS is a consultative body for proposals related to what Morocco calls their Southern Provinces , CORCAS also defends Morocco's claim over Western Sahara in local media and abroad. The CORCAS fully condemns the refugee camps of Tindouf and the Polisario Front, citing human rights concerns. There are 141 members of CORCAS, mostly Moroccan Sahrawi politicians and tribal leaders. The members were appointed by

342-495: The youths were bringing food, water and medicines to the protest camp, they were chased by the security forces since they fled El Aaiún. Elgarhi's family denounced the boy's secret burial, demanding a trial for the officers who shot him. On the early morning of 8 November, the protest camp was dismantled by Moroccan police forces, with 3,000 arrests. According to the Moroccan Interior Ministry, no firearms were used and

361-753: Was appointed governor of the Doukkala-Abda region, but was dismissed from that post soon after. He was replaced by Khalid Dkhil, member of the CORCAS and son of a mayor of Dakhla during Spanish colonization era, marking the first time that a Sahrawi was appointed governor of the Laayoune-Bojador region. On 29 November, clashes between Moroccan and Sahrawi students at the Moulay Rachid high school resulted in at least 29 injured, according to SADR 's Ministry of Occupied Territories and Communities Abroad, while sources in

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