Webinar - Fighting Back Against Starmer’s Police State

We live in a Dystopia where Opposing Genocide & Attacking Arms Factories is a Crime Whereas Profiting from the Death of Children is Lawful

Stop Starmer's Police State Webinar 30 August 2025

Last Saturday over 200 people attended our Webinar ‘Stopping Starmer’s Police State – Defending the Right to Protest’ to listen to six different speakers, three of whom have been arrested under the Terrorism Acts, one of whom is the mother of a daughter, Fatimah, who is in custody, Huda Ammori the co-founder of Palestine Action and Franck Magennis, a barrister at Garden Court Chambers who is presently one of the lawyers involved in seeking the deproscription of Hamas.

It says something about the nature of the Tory Party and its far-right leader, Kemi Bad Enoch (presumably her mother had forewarning of how she would turn out when she was named!) that its Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick, someone who is more comfortable in the company of neo-Nazis and asylum protesters, has branded as ‘sickening’ the bid to deproscribe Hamas.

Natalie Strecker’s pre-recorded speech

Unfortunately Natalie Strecker, who has been charged with a terrorist offence in Jersey, under laws similar but not identical to our own, did not feel able to attend and speak in person. She did however kindly agree to send us a video with her message and it is shown above

Filton 24 supporters stage demo outside prison holding activistsc / London

The first speaker was Sukaina Rajwani, whose daughter Fatema Zainab is one of the Filton 24, who have been incarcerated for a year now and can expect to stay in prison for another year before even facing a trial. This is completely outrageous. They are charged with non-terrorist offences yet they are being kept in appalling conditions in prison as if they were terrorists.

Teuta Hoxha has been held in prison without trial for the last nine months, and has been on hunger strike since 11 August as a protest against the denial of her basic rights. She says that she and her Palestine Action co-defendants are being monitored by the Counter Extremism Unit. See Filton 24 hunger striker tells the Canary government is monitoring her under counter extremism

It is a sad, sick comment on Starmer and Cooper’s Britain that young women and men who are trying to stop a genocide are treated like the worst criminals whilst arms manufacturers, who profit from the bodies of babies torn to shredd are feted, wined and dined.

One person who should be in gaol is Lord Dannat, a former head of the British army and a member of the House of Lords. He urged ministers to crack down on Palestine Action at the request of the US defence company Teledyne that employs him as an adviser.

Despite his claims of non-interference, police transcripts in a trial disclosed internal objections to his involvement, although a judge ultimately ruled that he had not interfered in the active investigation.

The revelation arrives amid existing scandals: Dannatt was already under two separate investigations. One from the House of Lords watchdog concerning a covert video of him offering access to ministers for commercial clients, and another into lobbying on behalf of CF Industries to save a fertilizer plant – where he received honoraria and leveraged his peerage for legitimacy. See Lord Dannatt urged ministers to crack down on Palestine Action at request of US firm and Scandal-hit Lord Dannatt now caught lobbying for arms industry against Palestine Action

Next up to speak was Mick Napier, Chair of Scottish PSC who has spent most of his active life being arrested. It is ironic that despite Scotland being ruled for most of that time by the Scottish National Party, the SNP has given next to no support to the Palestinians who are also fighting for their freedom from an alien occupation. Indeed the record of the Scottish Police is as bad as those in England. See SACC Statement on the Arrest of Mick Napier.

The next speaker was Richard Medhurst, a journalist who was arrested by the counter-terror police at Heathrow Airport and accused of ‘expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive of a terrorist organisation’. He was detained for 24 hours, his electronic devices seized and he has been waiting for over a year to see if he is going to be charged. See his account here.

Huda Ammori, the co-founder of Palestine Action was the next to speak and as always she gave a barnstorming speech outlining the growth of the campaign against Palestine Action’s proscription.

Next up was Franck Magennis, a prominent Irish and socialist barrister from Garden Court Chambers. Franck is involved in the attempt to secure de-proscription of Hamas. He has been targeted by the Israeli government front group the so-called Campaign Against Antisemitism for having told the racist Chief Rabbi Mirvis to shut his racist, Zionist mouth!

The CAA have submitted not one but two complaints against Franck.  Presumably on the basis that if one doesn’t succeed the other might! Among the things they objected to was the statement that:

“Zionism is collapsing. Keep hammering anyone who still identifies as a Zionist. Their apartheid state is a pariah. It’s on its way out, just like South Africa, like Jim Crow, like the French in Algeria. Escalate!!”

Most people would agree that this is a good example of the exercise of free speech but given that the CAA is an Israeli front group it’s not surprising that they believe that British standards of free speech should mirror those of Israel – where pro-Palestine speech normally results in arrest and a beating.

I was the last speaker and I will leave you to watch to find out what I said! Apart from, that is, taking Palestine Solidarity Campaign and Ben Jamal to task for having done nothing to support the campaign to destroy the proscription of Palestine Action. PSC still labourd under the illusion that they can, by staging demonstrations in London that no one reports and writing protest letters to MPs that no one reads, win over the British Establishment to the Palestinian cause. Softly, softly and mainstreaming is what they call a strategy.

After all the speakers had spoken there was a Q&A session. The meeting was co-chaired by Esther Giles of the Socialist Labour Network and Haim Bresheeth of Jewish Network for Palestine.

The meeting itself was sponsored by the JNP, Jewish Voice for Labour, the SLN and Scottish PSC.

Tony Greenstein