Palestine Solidarity Campaign Hauls Up the White Flag on Palestine Action’s Proscription

 Our Slogan Should Be 

'We are all Palestine Action'  

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.

Solidarity

Tony Greenstein

​