Old Bailey Palestine Action Protest
The Palestine Action group has been at the forefront of a direct action campaign in the UK against the Israeli war machine over the course of the genocide against the Palestinian people.
In August of last year, 18 activists stormed the Bristol based plant belonging to Elbit Systems, the largest weapons manufacturer in Israel, causing an estimated 1 million pounds worth of damage and reportedly resulting in major disruption to some of the most sensitive elements of the factory for many months.
All 18 were arrested and have since been charged under draconian UK anti-terrorism laws, sparking condemnation from human rights groups and observers across the world.
Protesters have gathered outside the Old Bailey court where members of the Palestine Action Group will appear in front of a judge in what legal experts call a critical hearing.
The protestors are calling for the immediate release of the activists and for the government to cease using anti-terrorism legislation against those who take measures to stop the genocide.
For the pro-Palestine movement in the UK, the government’s authoritarianism aims to both punish those taking action and deter others from also mobilizing against the Israeli war machine, which has several facilities in the UK.
They should not be being held in jail. This is absolutely unconscionable when you think how young they are, how none of them had criminal records before.
So there’s a whole thing to scare people off. But I think people aren’t scared any longer.
People are beginning to see the links between British imperialism, British racism, British history, not only in setting up the Zionist colonial state of Israel and Britain’s massive role over the last 75 to 100 years, since the Balfour Declaration and before, but also Britain’s role now.
Hannah, Fight Racism Fight Imperialism Group
And that role today has been to aid Israel’s catastrophic atrocities in Gaza as well as Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon, via British supplies of arms as well as intelligence and surveillance support for the Israeli regime.
The British government has been complicit with Israel in Palestine since 1917 in the Balfour Declaration.
So it goes back over 100 years, their complicity, they are just ramping up that complicity.
Israel basically runs this country. Israel controls Keir Starmer, Israel controls the police in this country.
It also controls our army and our military and our Air Force. Our base in Cyprus is being used day in, day out for the last two years.
Nick Georges, Palestine Action Group
Whatever happens during this hearing, one thing is for certain, there will be more people moved to take direct action and to try to disrupt the Israeli war machine’s genocidal campaign against the people of Palestine and the wider West Asia region, despite the British state’s attempts to deter them.
