The desperate last stand to save a forest from Tesla
During the nine months that it was ?occupied?, the Grunheide Forest became home to hundreds of people - some for a few days at a time, while others remained for months - and is described as ?a space for living and activism?.
But within three days, all occupants will have been evicted from the forest and 18 people will have been arrested; ground structures - which served as meeting places and communal areas, as well as treehouses, are completely destroyed.
Tension had already been palpable weeks earlier, with law enforcement vehicles frequently parked on the road outside the forest.
The protesters were living together in one community here. One of them, identified only as ?Max? and equipped with climbing gear and a walkie-talkie ready to act in case of an eviction alert, spoke to Al Jazeera before the evictions took place. ?I?m here because, in one place, we are opposing many issues such as green capitalism, extractivism in the Global South, patriarchy, racism, and the plans of a wealthy and powerful individual like Elon Musk," they said.
?I feel safe in the forest and love the community and welcome for who I am. We try to live the utopia we want to see in society while confronting a model that is destroying the world.?
Nevertheless, tension was running high in the lead-up to the evictions, as the occupants defended not only the local ecosystem but also vital reserves of drinking water.
