Just to be clear because everybody seems to be missing this point.
Palestinian Action, is an organisation. Membership of that group is banned, it is not illegal to support Palestinians or to call out Israel’s genocide. The government doesn’t like it when you do, but it’s not actually illegal for you to do it.
This organisation broke into a UK air force base in order to protest. They are not being charged because they protested, they’re being charged for breaking in and damaging a lot of military equipment. I think it’s a bit far to call them terrorists, but you can sort of see the government’s point, if you squint.
The UK government does however absolutely deserve to get it in the neck for their support of Israel. Labour have had a pretty awkward relationship with Israel in particular and anti-Semitism in general for a long time, and they’re now keen to be seen as supporters, but there are limits.
Thank you for this clarification. This is an extremely important context. “Palestine Action” is the particular name of a very specific organization, so the title of the article is obviously a bit misleading.
Still very worrying and more than a bit concerning, though. Here’s to hoping for a future strengthening of UK speech laws. Though, frankly, I’m not so sure about US speech laws anymore. Cheers.
Yes and I support that particular organization and the actions they perform. From what it sounds like reading the article, this very comment makes me a criminal in the UK
God bless the first amendment 🦅🇺🇲
What anti-Semitism where they accused of?
I don’t think it was ever anything concrete. Some members of the Labour Party made some comments that could potentially have been interpreted as being anti-semitic. Everyone went absolutely crazy, without anything in the way of evidence, and it caused a major political scandal. Labour themselves made the whole situation infinitely worse by not properly investigating the allegations, which made it look like they were trying to protect people. In reality I think it was just incompetence.
It was the very definition of a storm in a teacup, essentially nothing had happened but the opposition parties reacted as if it was some major scandal for the sole purpose of political point scoring.
Labour subsequently lost the 2019 elections and the suggestion was it was because of this scandal.
So when Starmer became leader one of the things he said he was going to do was root out anti-Semitism within the party (no matter how much he had to dig for it), this was around 2020 but he had been campaigning about it since around 2018. Anyway when he became leader there was a big bust up where he got rid of anyone he thought was being anti-semitic (again there was a lot of doubt about whether or not they were being). Then in 2024 they won the election. So ever since then they’ve been very careful to not appear anti-semitic to the point at which they are refusing to even acknowledge Israel’s war crimes.
This is all especially annoying since they would have won the 2024 general election no matter what because the Conservatives were polling so badly. So this big arguement about anti-Semitism was completely unnecessary. Had it not happened Labour would still be in power, but would be less inclined to shy away from criticism of Israel.
TLDR
Accusing Labour of been anti-semitic has been the default position of the opposition for a while because it works. Who cares about the truth anymore?
they’ve been very careful to not appear anti-semitic to the point at which they are refusing to even acknowledge Israel’s war crimes.
And that’s how you completely conflate the meaning of a word.
The bit you’ve skimmed over is that it happened under Corbyn, who was hugely popular with Labour members for being actually Left Wing, and hugely unpopular amongst the entire rest of the political and media establishments (including Labour MPs) for exactly the same reason. Pretty much everyone on all sides who’d never given a toss about antisemitism before were suddenly pearl-clutching over the tiniest statement made by a backbencher’s assistant’s brother’s gibbon because it was a handy way to bring Corbyn down without having to give any airtime to debating his (very popular) policies.
Thanks for clarifying, I’ve heard about the accusations before but never really understood what they were accused of… But I think the last couple of years of “anti-Semitism” left and right accusations aimed at individuals who are simply against the murder of innocent people help explain it. My guess is that some members of labour saw the Israeli regime for the terrorists they are ages ago and didn’t shut up about it… The Zionist lobby in the UK is obscene… Shame on these crooks!
I think it’s a bit far to call them terrorists,
Did you mean “a bit unfair”? Because I don’t see how anybody would be terrorized by this. It’s clearly illegal but using terrorism here is very problematic, especially since what the military does to people in the middle easy is actual terrorism but not called that.
Afaik the “anti-Semitism in Labour” was basically a made up smear by the Labour Party themselves to prevent Jeremy Corbyn getting elected. Not sure about other instances though.
Yeah, they lost an election over an antisemitism row a few years ago and have chosen the worst possible moment in history to start overcompensating for it.
It should be noted that it was the “please stop murdering children” kind of “antisemitism”, not real antisemitism.
The worst kind of antisemitismn, according to Isreal.
They are not being charged because they protested, they’re being charged for breaking in and damaging a lot of military equipment. I think it’s a bit far to call them terrorists, but you can sort of see the government’s point, if you squint.
Out of curiosity, I looked up the US Federal definition of terrorism
definition
- the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that-
- involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State;
- appear to be intended-
- to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;
- to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or
- to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and
- occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States
Due to the element danger to human life, their definition wouldn’t fit.
However, the UK legal definition
definition
- In this Act “terrorism” means the use or threat of action where—
- the action falls within subsection (2),
- the use or threat is designed to influence the government [or an international governmental organisation][1] or to intimidate the public or a section of the public, and
- the use or threat is made for the purpose of advancing a political, religious [, racial][2] or ideological cause.
- Action falls within this subsection if it—
- involves serious violence against a person,
- involves serious damage to property,
- endangers a person’s life, other than that of the person committing the action,
- creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public, or
- is designed seriously to interfere with or seriously to disrupt an electronic system.
- The use or threat of action falling within subsection (2) which involves the use of firearms or explosives is terrorism whether or not subsection (1)(2) is satisfied.
- In this section—
- “action” includes action outside the United Kingdom,
- a reference to any person or to property is a reference to any person, or to property, wherever situated,
- a reference to the public includes a reference to the public of a country other than the United Kingdom, and
- “the government” means the government of the United Kingdom, of a Part of the United Kingdom or of a country other than the United Kingdom.
- In this Act a reference to action taken for the purposes of terrorism includes a reference to action taken for the benefit of a proscribed organisation.
is wild: no danger to human life required, merely serious damage to property suffices!
In this Act “terrorism” means the use or threat of action where—
the action falls within subsection (2), the use or threat is designed to influence the government [or an international governmental organisation][1] or to intimidate the public or a section of the public
Wow, so the very act of peaceful protest is now defined as ‘terrorism’ because the below can be very loosely interpreted in whatever way necessary:
creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public
creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public
I don’t know: it’s possible. If legal definitions & case law (which I don’t know enough about) don’t settle their meaning, then they could mean anything. A lawyer could clarify.
For sure. e.g. Block the road, you block emergency vehicles / assault on emergency workers = terrorism.
I see: that technically could.
- the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that-
They even forbid the playing of “Don’t cry for me Argentina” during the wer to protect their Malvinas colony.
That would have been the Conservatives though. The Conservatives under Thatcher were in power during the Falklands war.
Same as in the US, that doesn’t matter.
They will always support their regime wars.
R/D in the US or Labour/Cons in the UK.
Warcriminal Blair is a good example.The actions one political party are irrelevant to the actions of another political party. Especially over the course of such time.
If you want to make the arguement that the labour party are warmongering then there’s much that you can do to make that arguement but to equate the current situation to the Falklands war is disingenuous at absolute best.
you are wrong
Codifying your genocide support into law. Nice.
If there is ever justice for Palestine the trials will be short. These bastards are so proud of their support for genocide.
if they promise to only paint things orange on military bases i think that’s ok
we’ll take their word for it
Nonviolent direct action has earned them the label “terrorists.”
“The closer the collapse of the Empire, the crazier its laws are.”
Marcus Tullius CiceroSomeoneGrrrrr, he very likely didn’t say that.
The closest to it I could find is “The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws” by Tacitus (The Annals of Imperial Rome).
Cicero lived at the end of the republic, his problem wasn’t too many laws…
Bang on mate. It’s here in the “Misattributed” section https://en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/Cicero
Cicero was world class complainer after all.
When the sentence is the same for non-violent protest and for actual terrorism, don’t be surprised if things get more extreme quickly.
Just more newspeak, like Trump calling everything he posts online “truths” while being nothing but lie after lie.
Removed by mod
The harder they push their pro-Israel agenda, the more anti-Israel everyone is going to get.
You can’t bully us into supporting a genocidal regime.
My fucking brain is so fried.
Both my parents were in World War II. They fought against fascism. I was brought up to feel for what happened to the Jews during that war. Now all I see is that they seem to be being worse than the actual Nazis.
Israel =/= the “Jews”.
Israel’s founders were actually very prejudiced against Jews that survived the holocaust. And much more against the ones that didn’t actually…
Louder for the people in the back!
Zionists = religious nationalists / colonialists / fascists
Anti-zionists = anti-all-of-the-above
The Jewish ethnic/religious part is completely irrelevant. There are many thousands of non-jews who support Israel’s genocide, as evidenced by this batshit draconian illegitimate law. The UK/USA likely created Israel solely to destabilize the region and have an ally in the middle of the oil they needed. Within the next decade they then overthrew Irans democratically elected socialist leader because he wanted to expel British Petroleum and nationalise production (like Norway has been doing for decades).
If you just hate jews you’re some flavor of fascist or religious nationalist, so no better than zionists or any of the criminals who created this mess.
Do not conflate Jewish people with Israel
That is a very important distinction
I guess I am ignorant in that respect. When I was taught back in the 60’s it was taught as the Jewish people and all dissidents, disabled and whoever else the nazi’s wanted out of the way.
I said what I did because in today’s world the labeling matters between Jewish people and zionists. Not because of anything that happened in WWII, but rather because you can condemn what the people in Israel are doing in Palestine and it has nothing to do with their faith.
However, there are people who will call you anti semetic for doing that and it’s just not true.
Yeah, nah.
The only people who win when you conflate Israel with all Jewish people are Zionists and Neo-Nazis.
What Israel is doing is very much Nazi like. But saying such will get you banned on Mastodon.social, and probably prosecuted in places like Germany.
I was brought up to feel for what happened to the Jews during that war.
And neglected to mention that it wasn’t just jews but anyone the nazis didn’t like, such as gays, communists, other races, etc.
I did not intentionally not mention them. I was just talking about them because they were the specific topic of discussion. Of course there were others.
I have a feeling they can. If all discourse over social media is anti Palestine and no one can refute it, I give it 10 years max before it would just be a frothing hate for Palestinians with a significant amount of the population.
They are already trying to do this and failing miserably at it. Censorship itself is an admission of guilt and is something that people are really starting to understand. That’s basically the point of my original comment: the harder they try to stop dissent, the more guilty they look.
Information can also be spread offline.
This is why the Fediverse and VPNs/Tor etc. are so important.
They are doing this because Palestine Action has been incredibly effective. They have already forced the closure of two factories in England that produce arms for Israeli defense company Elbit and forced Barclays Bank to divest through sustained sabotage campaigns. No person has been hurt by their actions, yet these actions have cost the genocide supporters millions of pounds and caused months-long disruptions to the production of weapons used in ethnic clean songs around the globe (Elbit weapons are fueling not just the Palestine ethnic cleaning, but Kashmir and DRC, too).
Wow protestors these days will stoop to the level of wisely putting pressure on major companies supporting genocide?!?
First property damage and now this??
clutches plastic pearls
Mossad has insane control over the world
In a “broken clock is right twice a day” type of thing, all the conspiracy theorists talking about how Jews secretly run the world have a bit of a point, although it’s specifically the Israeli govt/military and not Judaism as a whole. We, the most powerful military in human history, just hand them shit that goes bang for ethical (religious and lobbying) reasons and to actually hopefully bring about Armageddon. It’s disgusting
I think Jewish people were effectively invited into that position across much of Europe, back when the Catholic church forbade usury but the people still wanted banks.
Unfortunately for many Jewish people , some of their number became a major driving force for capitalism.
Not only is the ruling wrong - it is the very thing it claims to be opposing. It is itself an act of terrorism, carried out with the intention of inspiring fear in the British public to further a political agenda.
In every way, the British government is replicating the actions it accuses PA of - except that the scale of harm to British society and the terror inspired is magnitudes greater, and performed in service of the opposite political goal.
This is a terror attack by the government against the British people.
The British people’s opinion and will are the thing from which the goverment gains it’s only source of legitimacy - and they do not line up with the government on this issue.
But evidently the government believes in a different model of legitimacy: they believe that legitimacy is derived from the mere fact that they hold power. In the mind of the government and it’s supporters, the difference between a terrorist organisation and a legitimate government is just power and only power. To them, right and wrong has absolutely nothing to do with it. They think that they are winning, and that they are going to get away with it. Nothing else matters.
But evidently the government believes in a different model of legitimacy: they believe that legitimacy is derived from the mere fact that they hold power.
*Macht macht Recht"
Ignorance is strength freedom is slavery war is peace
I’m more shocked it hasn’t already happened to Extinction Rebellion, Insulate Britain or Just Stop Oil.
But I guess blockading motorways and rocking up to art museums dressed like extras from a Wham music video and defacing paintings makes you less of a threat than wanting Netanyahu to stop his genocide of the Palestinian people.
Still, calling blocking motorways and defacing painting terrorism is a stretch.
And that’s pretty much what Palestine Action did.
And that’s pretty much what Palestine Action did
Not quite.
three protestors from the group “stormed, scaled and occupied” an APPH drone factory in Runcorn.[33] Activists daubed red paint on the exterior, dismantled drone and aircraft machinery and destroyed windows
(…)
In January 2024, Palestine Action vandalised an office of the logistics company Kuehne + Nagel in Milton Keynes by smashing windows and spraying the building with paint
(…)
In May 2024, Edinburgh Palestine Action activists targeted a Leonardo factory in Crewe Toll (…) a spokesperson for the group saying, "In the early hours of Tuesday 28th May [2024], a group opened the box of cables, cut the internet wires, sprayed expanding foam inside the box
(…)
October 2024, Palestine Action targeted a factory in Bromborough, Wirral Peninsula, a producer of F-35 fighter plane (…) The action consisted of breaking through the roof and spraying red paint into cleanrooms, with a manager for Teledyne allegedly claiming "damage to the clean rooms could halt production for up to 12 months
They did proper sabotage as well.
In June 2025, members of Palestine Action gained access to RAF Brize Norton on electric scooters and used “repurposed fire extinguishers” to spray red paint into the engines of two Royal Air Force Airbus A330 MRTT refuelling planes
I think it’s also worth noting that this is the stupidest possible way of protesting against Israel and pro-Palestine. There are SO MANY weapons suppliers all over the place… But more importantly, Israel can do fine with domestic production when fighting Hamas/Hezbollah. They need external supplies for fighting Iran, sure, but this was all before that happened.
Yes alongside damaging historical artifacts
They get too much money from it. The things you listed are visible and awful, But, money…
Looks like the UK is going down the American road here. It’s time for all those UK citizens that said, “Rise up now!” to Americans months ago…time to rise up! Give us a great example!
Oh, you can’t because you have to work for a living? How about that…
There is also legislation that can be used to arrest most protestors. And you can face a multi-year prison sentence if you say something wrong on social media.
The UK is actually further along the dystopian path than the USA in some ways, but as is tradition they are trying to pretend it’s not happening.
During the Korean war a British unit was being overrun by the Chinese. The American general asked the British Colonel how things where and the Colonel said its a bit hairy. While the American general took this to mean they are ok. They got overrun and everyone in the unit was killed or captured.
I love these kinds of stories, but I think that specific example is just a misunderstanding of idioms, rather than an example of pretending something isn’t happening, though.
It is representative of how British people often avoid the truth or confrontations and instead use sarcasm, idioms, etc. that understate the situation.
The English are also a worldwide example of people who go “Oh no, everything is fine.” when everything is wrong.
There are even famous British comedies like Fawlty Towers, that have a lot of jokes about how they don’t like to be honest or confrontational.
UK has always had that 1984/Brazil (the movie, not the not-movie) vibe; it wasn’t all just pulled out of Orwell’s magic butt.
Going down?
That’s good reason to remind people, that law is written by particular people, mostly to protect those people interests.
Labour are class traitors.
So said Orwell many, many decades ago and people still vote for theae shitstains. There was some slight chance under Corbin but people want more Tory, so here we are.
Well Corbyn has just started a new party…
Has he actually because I keep hearing conflicting reports. A Labour MP left and claimed that she was joining a new party with Corbin, however I don’t think Corbin himself has actually confirmed this, and I thought he was done with politics anyway.
So this new party seemed to be carrying on the fine old tradition of the left being utterly useless at communications.
Well yes you are technically correct.
Zarah has quit Labour and Corbyn has said they will create something new. At this moment they are intending to create something new.
I wonder if any others in Labour or if any of the independants will join them. There should be a few and maybe they’ll have more than five members.
The most widely celebrated circumstance in the world is being rid of the British government. It’s spawned many holidays.
It is of course somewhat disingenuous to equate the empire to the modern British government. In much the same way that it makes no sense to say that Japan in its current form has any relation to feudal Japan.
Only difference is that they now only have a fraction of their power.
OTOH they 100% have the same horrible attitude.
Like the declining US now doesn’t realise they aren’t top dog anymore, the Brits who have been surpassed by them for a century still delude themselves and think they can and should dictate what the world should do.
Glad we had Brexit.
Always causing trouble and wanting it their way.
Embarrassing.
Feeding, housing and guarding someone for 14 years has got to be ridiculously expensive. All for uttering a few words.
Do prisoners in the UK do slave labor like in the US?
deleted by creator
Not yet
checks post, 9h
sets VPN to UK
I support Palestine Action
Just to be clear as much as this is an abhorrent thing for them to do, it won’t result in anything. The people who they have arrested have already been charged, so this changing the law doesn’t have any effect on that legal decision and pretty much no one else is associated with them.
They’re a very small very vocal activist group. The general feeling is that they actually did go too far on this. They are not banning protests in general just this particular organisation, which in fairness, did break into a military base so I don’t know what they expect it to happen.
So you’re probably safe from oppression, even if you were actually in the UK.
The general feeling is that they actually did go too far on this.
Vandalizing military equipment to protest against a genocide doesn’t strike me as “too far”.
What does the UK military have to do with a private company sending weapons to Israel? All the protesters are asking for is the weapon companies not to be allowed to send weapons from Israel from UK soil, I’m sure they would just send them from the US but at least it’s a stance.
The UK military isn’t doing anything in Israel so they are weird target
Breaking into a military base is basically the opposite of terrorism
I suppose an arguement could be made that terrorists might want to break into a military base and might use this group as a vehicle through which to do that. It would be an absurd arguement but it wouldn’t be totally irrational.
I don’t support this action by the UK government, but quite a few people in this thread seem to be of the opinion that the UK government is banning all protest which isn’t happening here. So I just wanted to set the record straight.
Didn’t we functionally ban all protests under Borris? something about them not being allowed if they inconvenience anyone in any way real or imagined so really you can only have them if you do it alone in a dark closet very quietly, or get permission in which case its not a protest.
…quite a few people in this thread seem to be of the opinion that the UK government is banning all protest which isn’t happening here.
Best to add a “yet” to the end of that sentence. This is just one more rung to the ladder.
It’s important to remember that the headline refers to the group Palestine action, which has carried out vandalisation of historical pieces, occupations of property, destruction etc (see here). So it’s a group that fits the UK definition of an extremist group.
Some political groups (or even branches of them) can be political cults trapping members with coercive control It’s not always idealistic well meaning people. The court that decreed them an unlawful group will have seen a lot of info we didn’t.
I think we need to look deeper than the headline
It’s important to remember that the headline refers to the group Palestine action
Coming into this thread, thinking that you couldn’t legally support Palestine in the UK anymore, I feel like the headline was just a bit misleading.
Yep it’s total clickbait, it’s bordering on misinformation
It’s rather misleading, yeah, but also, “technically correct”?
While we are clearly discussing an actual criminal group and not just people protesting for Palestine, the implications from a decision like that are a bit wider.
Civil disobedience is a crucial tool for democracy, but it’s easy for that to be taken too far.
And at this time that Russia is waging a shadow war in Europe, we probably should be little wary of any even paramilitary-esque groups, despite how important it is to protest the genocide in Gaza.
Surely there’s still plenty of legal ways to do that?
Sorry I’m not sure I understand. Are you saying that the criminal group shouldn’t be banned because the genocide is wrong?
No, I’m not saying that.
It’s just sometimes easy to smudge proper protesters with criminal groups, and historically that has happened a fair bit.
Like people can make a new organisation and try to step away from the criminal one, but also what’s to prevent the criminal element from joining them as well, and then the same justification can be used to ban that group and on and on and on.
So honestly defining the point at which it could be argued to be suppression of political ideas is very hard to pinpoint, imo.
I understand your concerns. The courts need a lot of evidence to do that though, and it’s a long process. So realistically it doesn’t happen unless it has to
Yeah, I’m just a tad worried, that’s all. I’m not saying it’s a slippery slide.
Just you know. It’s not been a great direction the world’s been going so…
By that very definition the US insurrectionists should be reintroduced to jail
I’d personally class that as terrorism. And they absolutely should be in jail.
Double Jeopardy. You need to get them for something else… Not that it would be hard to find something, I guess
Removed by mod
Dangerous and many voted against it. We already had politicians dead across both sides of the pond. Shouldn’t be encouraging this BS.
As long as you don’t touch Corbyn
Bah, he can get in the sea as well, he supported brexit
Save some room for the American politicians though please too.
Yeah but that’s been the opinion of the British public since the 1960s. Calling every British politician a useless skidmark (preferably to their face) is as close as we get to patriotism.
