caption id=attachment_21760 align=aligncenter width=500
Willem Van Spronsen with an Antifa comrade (left) --- Willem Van Spronsen (right) (Photo credit: Heavy)/caption
The Antifa movement in the United States is composed of left-wing autonomous militant groups and individuals engaged in
violent protest tactics against those whom they identify as fascist racist or on the far-right. The activists tend to be anti-capitalists and include anarchists communists socialists with some liberals and social democrats.
The Antifa movement has grown since the 2016 presidential election and as of
August 2017 approximately 200 groups existed.
Early Antifa groups were formed on the
west coast in 2007 beginning in Portland Oregon extending to Seattle Washington and then later spreading to other areas.
One of Antifas specimens was terrorist Willem Van Spronsen of Vashon Island.
In 2018 during a protest outside the federal immigration detention center in
Tacoma Washington south of Seattle the 68-year-old man wrapped his arms around a police officers throat and shoulders in an attempt to free another protester. When police got the man into handcuffs they found a collapsible baton and knife in his pocket leading to criminal charges.
On July 13 2019 Van Spronsen returned to the Northwest Detention Center the holding facility for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICA) this time armed with a rifle and incendiary devices. He tossed lit objects at vehicles and buildings causing one car fire and unsuccessfully tried to ignite a propane tank. Police officers were called by an ICE employee who saw the rifle. Four responding officers opened fire and then took cover uninjured. After medical aid arrived officers found Van Spronsen dead. He had multiple gunshot wounds according to the medical examiners office.
Van Spronsens attack came on the eve of a planned national raid by ICE targeting thousands of illegal immigrants who ignored court hearings or who had received removal notices. It was believed that Van Spronsen was targeting the detention centers parking lot which includes a fleet of buses that transport immigrants to the airport to be deported.
Van Spronsens attack if successful
would have taken hundreds of lives. The detention center holds over 1500 inmates.
ICE approved the release of video footage of the attack last month. In the video of the blaze set off by Van Spronsen before he was shot dead by police you can hear the officers firing on the Antifa terrorist who pulled a gun on them. Watch the
VIDEO here.
Van Spronsen called himself an anarchist and was active in the Washington states anarchist community. He was also once a member of the left-wing defense group called the Puget Sound John Brown Gun Club.
Like many deranged people before a killing spree Van Spronsen left a manifesto before his death. His friends say he likely planned to die during the attack.
In his manifesto sent out before his death he wrote: Its time to take action against evil" and Evil says one life is worth less than another. Evil says the flow of commerce is our purpose here. Evil says concentration camps for folks deemed lesser are necessary. The handmaid of evil says the concentration camps should be more humane. Beware the centrist."
In his personal life Van Spronsen had worked as a self-employed carpenter and contractor. He had been going through a divorce and child custody battle since 2013 and was accused of domestic violence by his estranged wife according to court documents.
He was also a folk singer playing shows on Vashon Island and around the Seattle area. He played at events and venues around his Vashon Island home.
He was close to the local transgender community although comrades" in the community said that Will self-identified as a cis male." One of his songs
I Was a Girl" claimed the same friends was about someone very important to him and it was not autobiographical.
Here is a
VIDEO of Van Spronsen at the Strawberry Festival in 2012.
Obviously the man was longing for another Woodstock that never came.
People like Willem Van Spronsen are multiplying in a geometric progression. The fact that he was relatively old and not young as many of his fellow Antifa activists are proves that America has a latent problem. It also proves that the sleep of reason disguised in tolerance" begets monsters. Time has come for more energetic actions against Antifa activities and their initiators.
NOTE - A version of the article was previously published in AMERICAN THINKER.
TIBERIU DIANU has published several books and a host of articles on law politics and post-communist societies. He currently lives and works in Washington DC and can be followed on MEDIUM.
*****
