The army, originally charged with its provision, decided not to distribute food over concerns of inciting a riot. This responsibility was eventually palmed off to NGOs formerly active in the camp, but only after POM had been without basic provisions for four days. In fact, the state’s primary response was to send nine contingents of riot police from Athens to “maintain public order”, water cannons and an anti-organised crime unit the Attika Security Directorate. In a move widely condemned as a feminisation of border security, 70 female police officers were dispatched to “soften” policing and “convince” women and children to relocate to the new camp. Medical teams were, on several occasions, prevented from accessing POM between the police blockades, and ambulances were denied entry. On September 18th, a police operation began to move all POM to a new temporary camp near Karatepe. Individuals were threatened by the police that if they did not go to the camp willingly, they would be imprisoned or that their asylum applications would be terminated. One worrisome feature of the crisis on Lesvos is the behaviour of vigilante groups. In the militarised context imposed by the New Democracy party, far-right, anti-migrant groups have proliferated across Greece. In the north, villagers clad in black clothes and heavy boots, resembling the Greek special forces, have formed vigilante mobs who now patrol the Evros border “looking for migrants.” Taken in the context of larger patterns of structural violence by state institutions, as well as the immediate forms of police brutality, such local reactions towards POM mark a significant and notable escalation in direct violence in Greece.