'Chilling effect': UK parliament votes overwhelmingly to ban Palestine Action activist group
Legislation passed in the Commons today after 385 MPs voted in favour of banning the group under the country's Terrorism Act 2000. Only 26 MPs voted against it.
The motion is expected to be debated and voted on by the House of Lords tomorrow before it becomes law.
If approved, it would become a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison to be a member of the direct action group or to support it.
Security minister Dan Jarvis told MPs that protesters expressing support for Palestine 'have always been able to, and can continue to do so' as he urged support to ban Palestine Action.
He said: 'Palestine Action is not a legitimate protest group.
'People engaged in lawful protest don't need weapons. People engaged in lawful protest do not throw smoke bombs and fire pyrotechnics around innocent members of the public.
'And people engaged in lawful protest do not cause millions of pounds of damage to national security infrastructure, including submarines and defence equipment for Nato.'
Pro-Palestinian activists have vandalised two military planes after breaking into an RAF base at Brize Norton in Oxfordshire.
Footage posted by the Palestinian Action group shows two people inside the base appearing to spray paint into the engine of a Voyager refuelling tanker.…
pic.twitter.com/GbOaWbNASD
— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News)
June 20, 2025
Palestine Action is seeking a legal challenge against the Government's bid to proscribe it, with a hearing expected on Friday to decide whether the ban can be temporarily blocked, pending further proceedings to decide whether a legal challenge can be brought.
The Government's move comes after two planes were vandalised at an airforce base on 20 June in an action claimed by Palestine Action.
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Five people have since been arrested on suspicion of a terror offence in relation to the incident.
Jarvis said the attack at RAF Brize Norton 'was just the latest episode in Palestine Action's long history of harmful activity', adding: 'Palestine Action has orchestrated a nation-wide campaign of property damage featuring attacks that have resulted in serious damage to property and crossed the threshold from direct criminal action into terrorism.'
But the minister faced backlash from some MPs who described the move as a 'draconian overreach' and likened the group to the Suffragettes.
The United Nations also warned ahead of the vote for the UK not to proscribe Palestine Action, as experts are concerned at the 'unjustified labelling of a political protest movement as 'terrorist'.'
Independent MP for Coventry South Zarah Sultana also told the Commons: 'To equate a spray can of paint with a suicide bomb isn't just absurd, it is grotesque.
'It is a deliberate distortion of the law to chill dissent, criminalise solidarity and suppress the truth.'
Former soldier Clive Lewis, now the Labour MP for Norwich South, said: 'I understand what terrorism is. I was in London on 7 July in 2007 and I watched my community, this city, attacked by real terrorists.
'And at that point, rightly or wrongly, I decided I was going to Afghanistan to fight the terrorists.
'And I went because I love this country, and I love our democracy, and I want to see it protected. I think today's proscription order against Palestine Action undermines that and I wish my Government wouldn't do it.'
The legislation approved by MPs also bans two white supremacist groups, Maniacs Murder Cult and Russian Imperial Movement, including its paramilitary arm Russian Imperial Legion.
The Home Office describes the Maniacs Murder Cult as a neo-Nazi transnational and online organisation which has claimed a number of violent attacks around the world.
Russian Imperial Movement is a ethno-nationalist group which aims to create a new Russian Imperial State. Its paramilitary unit fought alongside Russian forces in the invasion of Ukraine to advance its ideological cause.
It also runs a paramilitary training programme to support attendees to carry out terror attacks, the Home Office added.
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