“He was asking for help, because they were beating him to death.” On Sunday, 43-year-old Moroccan-born Abderrahim Fakir died while police officers were restraining him on the ground. The footage has drawn comparisons to the killing of George Floyd. Fakir was killed in Pilastro, a working-class neighborhood in Bologna. Video filmed by a neighbor shows at least two police officers pinning him to the ground as he calls for help and pleads for them to stop. Members of a medical response team can be seen standing nearby. The video rapidly spread on social media, prompting protests and demands for justice. Fakir’s relatives have called his death a “state assassination.” “They killed my brother in cold blood. I want justice,” said Khadija, the sister of Abderrahim Fakir. Social movements are demanding accountability for police violence, an end to racial profiling, and a stop to the militarization of working-class and migrant neighborhoods.

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