Here we go again. In Minneapolis another American citizen, a white man, with no criminal record, was shot dead by the infamous ICE. His name was Alex Pretti, a second generation Italian American. His grandparents, originally from Trentino, emigrated to the USA in 1896. They were called Preti, then the surname was distorted by the emigration office into Pretti.
Reason for the killing? He had defended a woman who was protesting, the newspapers said. He had pleased the policemen, Trump and the agents say. They killed him because he was defending a woman and also because he had a mobile phone in his hand and was filming the atrocities carried out by the heavily armed policemen sent by Trump to stop irregular immigration. He wasn’t armed, he didn’t have a gun in his hand. The videos we have seen confirm this. But that mobile phone held in Alex Pretti’s right hand could have hurt more than a gunshot fired at the policemen. He would have disgraced them, he would have shown the whole world what they were doing in Minneapolis. Legitimate defense now say the police. But what legitimate defense! The images speak clearly, the policemen shot and killed a man who had not committed any crime, he was protecting a woman, he was on the ground surrounded and mistreated with kicks and punches by seven or eight policemen. Could a man on the ground and unarmed do any damage? Now, however, after yet another killing, the Minneapolis revolt is expanding and many American citizens have taken to the streets to protest in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and many other states of the Union. America has finally woken up and is now demanding justice for the absurd death of Mr. Pretti, of Italian origin. And the Governor of the State of Minnesota has asked Trump to withdraw armed troops, troops who are behaving like the guardians of Ayatollah Khomenei’s revolution in Iran. Arbitrary arrests, even a 2 year old girl, violence, killings. The hangings are missing to make America look like Iran. For days and days we talked about Iran, rivers of ink to describe the atrocities of Khomenei’s corrupt regime, to describe the attitudes of the courageous girls who took to the streets to ask for a bit of freedom, but now we have to deal with America, with Trump’s troops sent to Minneapolis to control immigration and borders, with the street protests against the violent methods used by US policemen. And we talk about it for the violent methods used, for the roundups, for the arrests and for the expulsions of irregular migrants. Aberrant methods, methods of the worst regimes on the planet. The Americans have criticized the methods practiced in Iran but then they behave, perhaps even worse, like the ayatollahs who imprison opponents of the regime, who kill those who take to the streets, those who protest, those who smoke in public, those who do not wear the veil, those who want to sing the songs they like most, those who want to wear blue jeans like Western women. ICE’s use of force is the same as that used in Iran by the Revolutionary Guards. And we who have known a different America, who have loved and even served it, have now realized that Ice is not only the immigration force wanted by Trump, but the new face of an America that has become harsh, militarized, less democratic. It is not the America of the Statue of Liberty «Hold, O ancient lands, your vain pomp – it shouts with silent lips – Give me your tired, your poor, your cold masses eager to breathe free, the miserable refuse of your crowded coasts. Send them to me, the homeless, the storm-tossed, and I will raise my torch beside the golden door.”
Frank Gagliardi
