By G. Dunkel 
October 23, 2025

The British legal system has decided that carrying a sign reading “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action” is an infraction carrying a maximum penalty of 14 years in jail.

According to the British police, nearly 2,100 people have been arrested on anti-terrorist charges rising from carrying such a sign at protests and demonstrations since July when this ban went into effect.

Palestine Action was founded in 2020 to disrupt the operations of British weapons manufacturers connected to the Israeli government. It is committed to “ending global participation in Israel’s genocidal and apartheid regime.”

The organization engaged in occupations, blockades, spray painting, slashing tires, disfiguring statues and assorted other disruptions, mainly directed at Zionist targets in Britain. But in June 2025, two members with crowbars and spray paint sneaked onto a big British air force base and damaged two planes.

The Home Secretary Yvette Cooper used this attack to classify Palestine Action as a “terrorist group,” like Al Qaeda or ISIS, even though it was nonviolent. (CNN-UK, Sept. 6)

The court system doesn’t have the capacity to try 2,100 defendants expeditiously, so they are trying to force them into groups and limit the length of each trial to a few hours. (BBC, Oct. 11)

One notable feature of these arrests is that the average age of one batch of 500, the cops reported, was 54. Half of the arrested were over 60, a hundred or so over 70, and a handful were over 80. Generally the arrested protesters refused to walk to the police vans, forcing the cops to carry them.

The United Nations Human Rights Office and a number of amnesty groups have condemned the government’s campaign as a violation of the right to free speech and assembly. Dismissing the government’s efforts to stop a judicial review of the decision to ban the group, on Oct. 18 the Court of Appeal agreed to hear from Huda Amorri, one of the founders of Palestine Action on the validity of Cooper’s decision that it is a “terrorist” organization. The hearing is set for Nov. 25.

According to the Cradle, a progressive British website, “Defend Our Juries, a political group opposing the proscription, says authorities have weaponized counter-terror powers to silence opposition to Israel’s arms industry.” But given the ongoing campaign of carrying the “offensive” sign by thousands of people opposing Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the opposition has demonstrably not been silenced.