Large Demonstration Outside the Royal Courts of Injustice Today Declares
‘We Support Palestine Action’
We Support
Palestine Action Demonstration Outside the Royal Courts of Injustice Today 4
July 2025
At midnight tonight the proscription of Palestine
Action as a ‘terrorist’ group comes into effect, the High Court having turned down
an application to delay its implementation.
This so-called Labour government has driven a nail
through our democratic right to protest by proscribing a protest group, Palestine
Action as a terrorist group. In the process it has made the term ‘terrorist’
meaningless.
Instead of terrorism being acts of violence against
a civilian population, which is what the Israeli state is, any group which
interferes with Police State Starmer’s right to support genocide is liable to
also be proscribed.
The old saying that ‘one man’s terrorist is another
man’s freedom fighter’ has been proven correct. Most people see the Israeli state
as a terrorist state but to the war criminals who head our government,
murdering hundreds of thousands of people, executing Red Crescent and
humanitarian aid workers, bombing hospitals and murdering journalists is merely
collateral damage.
In the House of Lords yesterday peers defeated a ‘regret’
motion from the Green Party’s Baroness Jenny Jones by 144-16 though as in the
Commons it was the opponents of Starmer’s police state legislation that had the
better arguments.
Peter Hain, who in 1970 organised the Stop the Tour Committee
against the proposed tour of the Apartheid Cricket Team and the previous
Springbok Rugby Tour, told the Lords that if these powers had been in force
then they would have been used against campaigners against Apartheid in South
Africa.
Hain also drew attention to the fact that the
Suffragettes had been branded extremists and terrorists in their time. They had
even planned to plant bombs in Lloyd George’s new house.
It is a mark of the degeneracy of Starmer’s Labour
Party that they could introduce a
proscription order whose effect is to defend a genocide in Gaza happening
before our eyes. There is no principle that this so-called human rights lawyer
is not prepared to break in order to appease the United States and the Israel lobby.
What of Palestine Action?There was a large demonstration of over a
thousand people today outside the Palaces of Injustice in The Strand with their
mock gothic architecture. For once the Met didn’t try attacking any
demonstrators, at least not while I was there.
Predictably enough the High Court turned
down the application to delay the implementation of the legislation
although it is due to go to the Court of Appeal. However I don’t hold out much
hope that this reactionary court will overturn the lower court’s decision.
What next?Well Palestine Action held a packed 1,000 strong Zoom meeting tonight under
the title of The Plan but there was little evidence of such a plan although I
was told that this was because of the presence of police and other spies. The
meeting itself lasted less than an hour.
It remains to be seen whether or not there will be
deliberate attempts to make the legislation unworkable by simply flouting it or
whether Palestine Action will continue its work of attacking Elbit factories
but not in the name of Palestine Action. One name that has been proposed is
Yvette Cooper, the trollope who, as Home Secretary, brought the order forward.
What is certain is that the proscription of a direct
action protest group marks a new low for a government led by an empty suit
which has attacked claimants, the disabled, parents with more than two children
and protesters. It is laying the basis for Farage’s Reform party at the next election
which is why the decision of Zara Sultana to resign from the Labour Party is so
welcome.
It is to be hoped that Jeremy Corbyn abandons his
usual indecisiveness and hesitation and comes out in support of Sultana’s
decision. It is also to be hoped that other left-Labour MPs like John McDonnell
follow suit.
What is needed however is a broad based campaign to
roll back the ongoing attack on democratic rights, not just by Starmer but the
previous Tory government too.It is no
surprise that those who are supporting genocide in Gaza are eager to clamp down
on democracy at home.
Instead of Helping Implement the Proscription of Palestine
Action You Should Be Doing Your Best to Frustrate It - As Martin Luther King said:
Please note
the date is wrong but the link is correct.
It is
Friday 4 July 7.30 pm
Register Here
bit.ly/PalActionPlan
If you want to add your name to this Open Letter please let me know at azvsas@gmail.com
Monday 30 June, 2025
Dear
Ben Jamal,
I
write as one of the original founders of Palestine Solidarity Campaign although
I resigned in 2022 as a result of PSC’s abandonment of anti-Zionism in the new
Constitution which you supported.
I
have subsequently observed in wry amusement that you now claim to have been
anti-Zionist all along. However as long as you don’t call for the replacement of
a Jewish Supremacist state by a Unitary Democratic State
it is impossible to consider PSC anti-Zionist.
We
are living through the world’s first live streamed genocide in Gaza and the
fulfilment of Zionism’s Messianic End Times. US and British imperialism are
wedded to supporting Hitler’s
Bastard Offspring. Today when genocidal and exterminationist ideas are
commonplace in Israel and when nearly half of Israeli Jews support
exterminating the Palestinians of Gaza, the last thing we should do is retreat
in the face of government threats of proscription. Today the Nazi doctrine of
Death by Hunger is the official policy of the Israeli government.
Ben Jamal
Despite
the creation of a mass Palestine solidarity movement, both in Britain and
internationally, we have not been able to stop the Genocide. At best we have
been able to limit the carnage and force Zionism’s mafia bosses in Tel Aviv to
admit a bare minimum of aid.
PSC,
together with Stop the War Coalition and other groups, have organised
impressive demonstrations in London but by themselves theyhave failed to change
British government policy, wedded as it is to NATO and the alliance with the United
States. Today we are led by war criminals and we must act accordingly.
A
chance was missed in January when the Police banned the march from starting
from outside the BBC. The Metropolitan Police adopted wholesale the Zionist smear that the marches offended Jews worshipping in a distant synagogue,. Instead of saying
that you would call the march at the BBC regardless of the Police’s attempt at
sabotage you meekly complied by rearranging the starting point in Whitehall, which
enabled the Police to kettle, harass, arrest and attack protestors.
By
way of contrast, one of the most successful groups in the past five years has
been Palestine Action.It has been so
successful that the government has been forced to try and proscribe it as a
terrorist organisation. This is the first attempt to ban a protest group as
‘terrorists’. This attempt has been met with a wave of opposition from other
protestand civil liberties groups,
charities and academics reaching
into the Home Office itself.
If
anything represented a line in the sand then this is surely the issue – the proscription
of a protest group as ‘terrorists’. It is an assault on the most basic of rights
of a democratic society, the right to protest and freedom of speech, Articles
10 and 11 of the European Convention of Human Rights.
As
you are aware, having often quoted them yourself, protest movements have a long
history of defying coercive and repressive laws when democratic rights and
basic freedoms were under attack. Slavery abolitionists, trade unionists,
Chartists and Suffragettes were prepared to put themselves on the line. As Martin
Luther King said
in his Letter from a Birmingham Gaol
‘one has a moral responsibility to
disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law
is no law at all."
A
law, which is passed, which erodes our democratic rights is an immoral law.
This was the position of the Suffragettes, the Chartists and all manner of
social movements in the past. This is a law fit for a Police State and yet you
insist that PSC branches and members meekly comply. In your ‘advice’
you write
PSC’s position is clear – we will not
allow any branch to jeopardise the organisation and the movement by
taking such actions in the name of PSC. It is vitally important for
all branches to understand this and to act accordingly – ensure that
no branch communications profess support for a proscribed
organisation, that no events are planned in support of a proscribed
organisation, and that no clothing or signs are used which profess support for
a proscribed organisation
The
Police, the Courts and the State have been implacably opposed to the Palestine
solidarity movement.Why?Because the West’s alliance with Israel is
based on strategic imperialist interests. Israel is the West’s attack dog. This
is why Palestine Action has been targeted. To the state Palestine Action’s
opposition to Britain’s military co-operation with Israel is no different from
that of Hamas. Hence the proposed proscription.
Whereas
Western regimes have supported the Zionists the people have supported the Palestinians
as opinion
polls have consistently demonstrated.The reception of the audience at Glastonbury to Kneecap and Bobby Vylan’s
chants
of ‘death to the IDF’ demonstrates who has the ear of the young.
We
see this in the decision
of the High Court on Monday approving the sale of F-35 components even
though the judges knew full well that they will be used to commit genocide.
The
Guardian reported
on Saturday that ‘concerns about
proscribing Palestine Action extended into the home secretary’s own
department.’ A senior civil servant was quoted as saying that ‘Home Office staff are concerned about the
“absurd” decision to ban Palestine Action under UK anti-terrorism laws.’
“From desk to desk, colleagues are exchanging
concerned and bemused conversations about how absurd this is and how impossible
it will be to enforce. Are they really going to prosecute as terrorists
everyone who expresses support for Palestine Action’s work to disrupt the flow
of arms to Israel as it commits war crimes?
If
ever there was a time for civil disobedience it is now. It is fine citing the
example of groups in the past which broke the law for the common good but there
comes a time when PSC has to decide which is more important – obedience to the
law or solidarity with the Palestinians. If PSCrefuses to contemplate civil
disobedience it is more of an NGO than a solidarity campaign.
The time to refuse to accede to the proscription of Palestine Action, whilst Zionist genocide
groups go unmolested, is now. If thousands of people openly defy the
proscription by refusing to accept Police State Starmer’s equation of Protest
Groups with Terrorism then the law willbecome inoperable.
‘To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under
the heaven.’
Now is that time but to the leadership of PSC,
afraid as you are of your own shadow, the idea of civil disobedience is something
you praise in history not something you yourselves participate in. Past heroism is easy to praise. Doing it yourself is something else.
PSC has never missed an opportunity to miss an
opportunity. Unlike the Anti-Apartheid Movement of the 1970s it is afraid to build
a popular movement that challenges the State’s support for genocide. The vast
majority of the population, both in Europe and the United States are utterly
sick of the genocide in Gaza yet PSC is afraid of breaking the law.
Now
is the ideal time to put a spoke into the Zionist wheel. Now is the time to
defy yet another anti-Palestinian law with both right and public opinion on our
side. Yet what do you do?You instruct
members and branches of PSC to fully implement the ban on supporting Palestine
Action if the law comes into effect. Let’s be blunt. You are doing the work of
the Zionists for them. You don’t know what to do with a mass movement except
march them up the hill and down again.
You
have no perspective beyond the accumulation of funds and the employment of more
staff.PSC has made over a million
pounds from Israel’s genocide in Gaza yet politically you are still as timid as
when, in 2022, you took anti-Zionism out of the constitution.
What
is your justification? The threat of 14 year prison sentences? I doubt if even
Lady Justice Carr, the most reactionary Chief Justice since Lord Denning would
dare impose such a sentence but more importantly public opinion would not stand
for it. The best way of avoiding prison sentences is mass defiance of the law
such that it will be impossible to implement it since it is clear to all that Palestine
Action is not a terrorist group. Embedding a lie within the law will not make
it true.
A mural was painted in Gaza over a year ago to thank us for taking direct action against Israel’s war machine.
Now, more than ever, Palestinians need us to step up.
Your
fear of challenging the unjust laws that Yvette Cooper is proposing stems from
your fear of upsetting the applecart. To be blunt you are afraid of challenging
the undemocratic British state and prefer to sacrifice the Palestinians
instead. It was not PSC but Palestine Action that had a mural painted for
it in Gaza.Palestine Action have
achieved in 5 years more than PSC have done in 40.
What is the purpose of PSC if not to support the Palestinians?Palestine Action has closed 3 Elbit factories
and premises in its five years of existence. It has posed a challenge to the
Israeli state’s operations in this country which PSC with all its staff and
resources have not been able to match. Hence its proscription.
I am not at all surprised by your behaviour. When Palestine Action was
formed in July 2020 PSC did all that it could to strangle it at birth. Your ‘legal
advice’ then was a carbon copy of your advice today. You wrote:
PSC has sought legal advice about the potential
liabilities arising from the commission of acts of criminal damage of high
monetary levels ... If the value of the damage caused exceeds £5000 a person
can be sentenced to a maximum of 10 years imprisonment and/or an unlimited
fine.
These liabilities potentially extend to both
individuals encouraging or assisting criminal acts (including, for example,
providing financial support), and organisations, including PSC branches that
offered encouragement or assistance.
These concerns are not raised because PSC, or the
BDS Movement is opposed to any form of direct action. Instead, they are raised
because of the strategic and legal risks associated with the type of action
being conducted by the group.
If supporters
of the Palestinians had taken your advice and if members of PSC had gone along
with it then Palestine Action would not have existed. You were forced
to change course because PSC members and supporters disregarded your advice. Today
you write
that:
Publicly inviting support, for example
through a social media post, wearing clothing which indicates support, or
arranging a meeting where a member of a proscribed organisation speaks or a
speech indicating support for the organisation is given are all criminal
offences which can carry prison sentences of up to 14 years
That
is true, theoretically and that is why mass
action in defiance of this law is necessary and should be organised, with PSC’s
help if possible, without it if necessary. The proscription of Palestine Action
can only be challenged by mass defiance, not the timidity of PSC under your
tutelage. PSC itself should be taking the lead instead of trying to frighten
its members. There is nothing stopping national PSC declaring that its support
for PA remains unchanged.
You and the leadership of PSC have always been hostile to PA because you saw it as a competitor. In January
2022 when PA achieved its first victory with the closure of Elbit’s Oldham
factory PSC was eager
to claim the credit. You issued a statement which said:
We pay tribute to all
those who have campaigned since Elbit Systems purchased the site in 2007,
including many members of the Manchester PSC branch
‘I have to pay tribute to whoever drafted the
statement. It must have taken some effort to draft a statement welcoming the
closure of the factory without at the same time mentioning the group which was
responsible for the campaign that was responsible for this success.
Because
British imperialism supports Zionism and Israel there is no legal way to
prevent the state supporting Israel short of mass action. That is why defiance
of the law is an essential component of any solidarity action. Of course that
does not mean we defy the law on any and every occasion but we choose the time
and place. This is such an occasion. The classifying of a protest group as a terrorist
group breaks new ground. It is a red line for more than just the Palestine
solidarity movement. It has united Palestine solidarity supporters with
virtually the whole liberal and even not so liberal establishment. It is
indefensible. If any issue was likely to be won by a refusal to cowtow to the
Police and State this is the time.
Your real
reasons for opposing a refusal to implement the law have nothing to do with
possible prison sentences for those who defy the law. They have everything to
do with your empire building and the cushy salaries that comes with it.
You say
that ‘The people of Palestine are depending on us now, during their darkest hour, and we cannot afford to let them down.’ Yet by colluding
in the implementation of this law that is precisely what you are doing. You are
helping the British state implement this police state law.
Frank McGinnis, Barrister at Garden Court Chambers,
on Palestine Action
I have just been sent a copy of a message from Lambeth & Southwark PSC
to its members/supporters re the proscription of Palestine Action. I don’t know
whether it derives from PSC nationally but I suspect it does. It says:
" It is very important that members of the PSC and supporters of our
branch do not take any protest action in the name of the PSC, as this could
seriously jeopardise PSC's work and the movement – thank you."
This is the very
opposite of what is required. Meek compliance with the law rather than a refusal to comply with it
will guarantee that the ban on Palestine will be accepted.
Our slogan should be 'We are all
Palestine Action'. Palestine Action has been
proscribed because it is the most effective group campaigning against the
genocide. At a time of Genocide it is incumbent upon us to take risks and to
defy the government when it outlaws free speech.
When you embed a lie within the law, it renders the
law illegitimate and worthless. If thousands of people take up the cry that we
are all Palestine Action then the law will be rendered inoperable. If we meekly
comply with the law then we will do what this genocidal Labour Government wants
us to do.
There comes a time to make a stand and that time is
now. Free speech is the basis of all our democratic rights. Without it there is
no democracy.
The proposed law the dictat of an unpopular
government. It has no popular mandate and has been met with an avalanche of
opposition stretching well beyond the usual suspects. From the Chartists to the
Suffragettes to the Pentonville dockers, when the law is bad then the only way
to change it is to break it.
Instead of advocating compliance PSC should be encouraging
MPs in Parliament to say that they will declare themselves supporters of Palestine
Action in the Commons protected as they are by parliamentary privilege.
For PSC to wave the white flag now is unforgivable
and should be opposed. If thousands of us refuse to comply the law will be
rendered inoperative. When Palestinians are dying in their thousands we have to
also make sacrifices.
The time for token actions, which is the favourite
action of PSC is over. If PSC had defied the Police over the demonstration at
the BBC in January the Police's right to ban demonstrations on grounds of
'antisemitism' would have been brought into sharp relief.
There is a time for civil disobedience and the time
is now. They cannot imprison and
prosecute thousands of us.
We should ask left and socialist groups to carry
the message on the front page of their papers that ‘We Support Palestine Action’. This is a Police State Law and should
be treated as such.
The Attempt to Smear Palestine Action as Terrorists Can Be Defeated By People Declaring ‘We Are All
Palestine Action’ & Refusing to be Deterred by the Lie that
Protest=Terrorism
Sit
in at Brighton Station & Demo In Protest Against the US Strike Against
Iran's Nuclear Facilities
Last
Monday was a day of two demonstrations on two separate but interlinked issues.
At midday there was the energetic and lively demonstration against the
proscription of Palestine Action as a ‘terrorist’ group.
At
5.30 pm when back in Brighton there was firstly a sit-in at Brighton Railway
Station and then a march and demonstration against the United States attack on
Iran.I am posting videos and photos
from both demonstrations. I spoke twice at the Brighton demonstration and
sit-in.
Rally at Brighton Clocktower
Tony Greenstein Speech at Brighton's Clocktower on 23 June after a march against the Attack on Iran
Just
as in 2006 when a ceasefire was agreed between Israel and Hezbollah, which
Israel got Bush to arrange when Israel was getting the worst of the fight, so
too with the ceasefire that Trump arranged on
Tuesday.
The
ceasefire was clearly at Israel’s behest. Trump also came out with strident
criticism of Israel for having broken the ceasefire not understanding that in Israel’s
eyes a ceasefire means you cease and we’ll fire.
Rally at Brighton Clocktower
Demonstration Against the Proscription of Palestine Action 23 June 2025
Israel
launched the attack on Iran hoping to remove its regime and thus establish
complete dominance in the region.The
lie that Iran was developing nuclear weapons has been comprehensively
discredited by US Intelligence.
However we
should be clear. Israel and the United States attack on Iran never had anything
to do with Iran' non-existent nuclear weapons. The aim is to eliminate the
Iranian state from disrupting Israeli and US plans for the Middle East.
An extension of the Abraham Accords with Saudi Arabia at its centre.
The latest manifestation
of this is The
Abraham Shield which is Israel’s
New Blueprint for Regional Control After Gaza. The aim is the integration
of the Gulf and Arab economies with that of Israel as the latter excludes the
Palestinians, both physically and politically from having any say in their
future. It is an Orwellian nightmare of total control by Israel and the Arab
regimes of the destiny of the Arab peoples.
The
attack on Iran has been the fulfilment of a 20 year wet dream by Netanyahu. He believed
that with Trump in power that he could drag the US into the conflict. However
despite the fact that the US bombed three nuclear installations, it was clear
that the US didn’t want to get embroiled in Netanyahu’s war.
Netanyahu
was under the impression that the surprise attack on Iran would be a cakewalk.
It was anything but. Instead Iran gave Israelis a chance to experience what Palestinians
in Gaza have experienced with demolished buildings and streets and an
understanding of what war means in reality. One-third
of Tel Aviv was damaged or destroyed.
Not
since 1948 in the so-called War of Independence has Tel Aviv been bombed
(by the Egyptian airforce).If Hezbollah
had done the same when they had the chance then Israel might have thought twice
about devastating Gaza.
The Police were at their aggressive best
What
now? Israel will not give up easily having been bruised in the current
encounter. Iran will need to replenish their missile stocks and renew their air
defences as well as trying to supply their allies in the region, the so-called
Axis of Resistance, with new weaponry.
But the challenge is not only military but political and this is where the Iranian regime is fatally flawed. It is a repressive, undemocratic regime that is at odds with its own citizens. Although Iranians rallied round when Israel was attacking it, they are not going to tolerate a corrupt and dictatorial clerical state that believes in using religion to justify its attacks on women, minorities and the working class.
Rally at Brighton Clocktower
Iran suffered a great deal of damage from Israeli air attacks on its infrastructure. It is also suffering from economic sanctions and the thinly veiled hostility of neighbouring Arab regimes. Both Jordan and Saudi Arabia were involved in shooting down Iranian missiles. Qatar hosts the largest US base in the region.
Iran is unable to respond to these treacherous regimes precisely because it is not dissimilar in its contempt and repression of its own people. That is the problem for those who believe that the struggle is simply military. The Iranian regime is unable to appeal to the wider Arab populace as Egypt's President Nasser was once able to. Theocratic dictatorships are not popular, either in Iran or Saudi Arabia.
Of one thing we can be sure and that is that Israel is not going to give
up and it is going to enlist the Arab regimes in its plans. The Iranian regime,
which believes it can ally with those regimes is very much mistaken if it
thinks they will help it resist US imperialism and its Israeli attack dog.
The Mullahs are incapable of a genuine anti-imperialist alliance because
that would mean allying with the very forces, the Arab street, which in Iran
would also remove its own dictatorship.
The Iranian regime is often seen as anti-imperialist and anti-Zionist.
This is a mistake. It had a golden
opportunity with its ceasefire with Israel to demand that Israel also agree to
a ceasefire and withdrawal in Gaza. I doubt if the idea even entered the head
of Khameini and Iran’s rulers.
In
Lebanon the forces of the state and the Phalangists are encircling Hezbollah
which has become very unpopular given the way they handled the confrontation
with Israel. Allowing suppliers to provide them with pagers containing
explosives without checking them raises the question as to how they were so
careless.
It
is clear that Hezbollah was penetrated from top to bottom by Zionist agents and
that Israel was in possession of real time information about the whereabouts of
Hezbollah’s leadership.
Rally at Brighton Clocktower
But
the real problem is that Hezbollah became part of the corrupt Lebanese
Establishment. It had no programme for social and political change that could
unite the different communities. It had no proposals for ending the confessional
nature of the Lebanese political system whereby a Christian becomes
President, a Sunni Prime Minister, a Shi’ite Speaker of the Parliament etc. The
128 seats in Parliament are divided equally between Muslim and Christian
despite Muslims being in a majority.
Rally at Brighton Clocktower
Changing
this was the main goal of the Lebanese National
Movement in the civil war of the 1970s. A civil war which saw Syria’s Assad
intervene on the side of the Phalangists.
MSNBC on Donald Trump and his Lies About 'Obliterating' Iran's Nuclear Sites
Netanyahu
succeeded in his aim in that the US bombed Iran's 3 nuclear sites last
weekend. Unfortunately for Trump, despite his boasts that
he had obliteratedthe facilities it is clear that the MOABs did not do the job as the
facilities were too well protected.
The Familiar Face of Alexei Sayle
However
the present ceasefire is not designed to last and we can be sure that Israel will
be plotting with the traitorous Arab regimes, not least those of Jordan and Saudi
Arabia how to renew the conflict.
It
now seems that a desperate Israeli military has taken to threatening
Iranian officials and their families: rebel or we’ll kill you
The guy on the right was the speaker before me
"WE ARE ALL PAL ACTION"
Meanwhile
at home Palestine Action is due to be proscribed despite massive opposition to
Starmer’s giant step towards a police state. It is clear to most people that
the terrorists are the genocidaires not those who oppose them.
Even
that beacon of fair-weather liberal opinion, The Guardian, has come out strongly against the proposals of
Starmer and Cooper with its legal correspondent Haroon Sidique saying it would
have a ‘chilling effect’
on other protest groups, which of course was the whole purpose.
Its leading
article asked ‘if red paint is
terrorism, what isn’t?’ begging the question as to why the Guardian backed
Police State Starmer and the ‘feminist’ Yvette Cooper against Jeremy Corbyn in
the first place.
The war of this miserable
‘Labour’ government against our democratic rights, coupled with their attacks
on the disabled and working class people shows that it is nothing but a
continuation of the Tories. Labour is preparing the way for Nigel Farage’s
far-right racist Reform.