“Only three of Palestine Action’s at least 385 actions would meet the statutory definition of terrorism.” That’s not a quote from an activist. It’s not even from a defence lawyer. That’s the admission of the British state, buried in the very intelligence assessment used to justify the proscription of the group.
On 5 July, Yvette Cooper, Labour’s Home Secretary, signed off on one of the most authoritarian acts in modern British political history: the designation of Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation. It was a nakedly political manoeuvre. Now the High Court hears that the vast majority of the group’s actions were peaceful, lawful, and explicitly non-violent. But that’s never really mattered. The goal was not to prevent terrorism, but to stifle resistance, to criminalise dissent, and to send a message to all who would dare protest British complicity in Israeli apartheid.
“This is obviously an officer that doesn’t understand the law at all,” the judge muttered, referring to police who arrested people for holding placards, wearing T-shirts, or simply mentioning the word Palestine in public. You would laugh, if it weren’t real.
The decision to ban Palestine Action was not driven by any credible security threat. As the court heard, Foreign Office officials were wary of the optics: they urged delay, cautioning that the timing (just days after Israel resumed its brutal assault on Gaza) would make it look like Britain was acting in defence of genocide. Which, of course, it was.
Palestine Action have done what no parliamentary party has dared: directly confronted Britain’s role in arming Israel. Their methods. Spraying blood-red paint, blockading arms factories, dismantling Elbit drones. Are performative but also targeted, disruptive, and designed to make the invisible visible. That is their true offence. Not terrorism, but tactless truth.
“The killing of vast numbers of innocent people in horrific ways – burning, being shot, starving, exploding with bombs – that’s probably why so many people feel strongly about it. Wouldn’t you think?” – Juliet Stevenson
Meanwhile, the Telegraph is throwing a tantrum about “luvvies.” A bleating, cowardly column claims Palestine has become a “trendy” obsession of artists and performers. From Bob Vylan to Brian Eno, Vanessa Redgrave to Juliet Stevenson. There’s a strange obsession in these pages with opera houses, punk gigs, and the Edinburgh Fringe. As though pro-Palestinian sentiment among artists were some elite conspiracy rather than a reflection of genuine human anguish at the slaughter of tens of thousands. The author, Liam Kelly, seems baffled as to why artists aren’t waving Ukrainian flags on stage too, as if this were a zero-sum grief Olympics.
But the question answers itself. One state is committing ethnic cleansing with British bombs. The other isn’t. There’s no Equity letter needed for Sudan. No Elbit drones for Khartoum.
That so many artists, musicians and performers are willing to risk their careers, their bookings, and their freedom is not evidence of a fashionable cause. It’s evidence of political failure. The stage has become a battleground because the Commons is silent. The gallery floor is more honest than the front bench.
“The reason it is made in increasingly desperate tones and increasingly erratic and spontaneous expressions,” says Equity’s Paul W Fleming, “is because it’s harder to express solidarity with Palestine than it is over other issues.”
This is what happens when protest is outlawed, marches corralled, resistance mislabelled as terrorism. The spectacle spills elsewhere. Into opera houses and fringe shows. Onto banners, murals, and T-shirts. What the state tries to silence, art dares to amplify.
The Labour government has crossed a line. It has decided that opposing genocide is now a crime. That supporting Palestine is suspect. That damage to property is terrorism, but the bombardment of a refugee camp is not. That a painted drone in Leicester is an outrage, but a bombed school in Rafah is business as usual.
This isn’t security policy. It’s political repression. It is moral cowardice dressed up in the robes of legality. And if we don’t fight it (loudly, creatively, and unapologetically) we will lose not just the right to protest, but the very meaning of dissent.
Because let’s be clear: if you ever find yourself on the same side as the Home Office, the Telegraph, and the riot squad, you aree not just on the wrong side of history. You are on the side of power, silence, and complicity.
