What Do Authoritarians Fear Most? People Who Stick Up for Each Other.

by Matt Agorist,The Free Thought Project:

(Truthout) Even before Donald Trump launched a war on Iran, his presidency had heightened the strain on millions of people in the United States struggling with high prices and precarious work. Now, as the U.S. and Israel escalate their violence in the Middle East, pressures at home are intensifying.

Higher prices at the gas pump make the war-related surge in energy costs visible to all. Less apparent aredisruptions to global fertilizer suppliesresulting from the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Combined with widespread drought and the impacts of tariffs, the fertilizer shortage could cut food supplies, worsening the affordability crisis and spreading food insecurity.

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These converging shocks are testing our communities. But what we know is that the most reliable form of resilience is not individual wealth or distant institutions, but solidarity — the power of ordinary people to collectively meet their needs and determine the conditions of their lives.

Many people think of community resilience as the ability to withstand abrupt shocks, like anatural disaster.But resilience is much more far-reaching, as the people of Minneapolis are demonstrating.

As federal immigration enforcement surged into the Twin Cities — detaining and deporting people, and brutalizing protesters — ordinary people mobilized. Volunteers met detainees who were released from the Whipple Federal Building with nothing but the clothes on their backs, often in subzero temperatures. They made sure someone was waiting in a warm car with coats, food, transportation, and access to phones. Others organized grocery deliveries to families afraid to leave their homes, or helped ensure children could travel safely to and from school, or tracked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids in real time.

These efforts did not emerge overnight. They were possible because Minneapolis already had a powerful scaffolding of relationships, organizations, and mutual aid practices. Mass protests following the 2020 police-perpetrated killing of George Floyd deepened relationships and coordination across the city. When ICE surged, people knew how to respond and who to call.