Hundreds arrested over Palestine Action warned of 14-year jail terms

Times

3 days ago

Hundreds of protesters arrested over support of Palestine Action have been threatened with 14 years in jail, as the victims minister promised they would feel 'the full force of the law'.
Alex Davies-Jones said that ministers had evidence that the group, which is banned under anti-terror laws, had 'targeted Jewish-owned businesses' and had links to 'hostile state actors' based on secret evidence.
'There is a limit of up to 14 years in prison if you support a proscribed terrorist organisation here,' she told Sky News. 'If you are showing support for a terrorist organisation, you will feel the full force of the law.'
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She told protesters backing the organisation's campaign against starvation in Gaza to 'think again', warning them that their actions 'aren't necessarily what they seem'.
On Sunday, the Metropolitan Police said it faced 'entirely unrealistic' challenges in policing a protest in support of the group, at which more than 500 people were arrested.
Activists who were detained on suspicion of terror offences were later bailed on the spot, leaving overwhelmed officers unable to stop them from returning to the protest.
Palestine Action said the protest was a 'momentous act of collective defiance' as police were forced to arrest 532 people, including 15 over 80 years old and 112 over 70, on suspicion of showing support for a proscribed organisation. Under the law, support for the group can lead to a prison sentence, although most of those arrested are expected to be fined.
To prevent police stations being overwhelmed with arrested protesters, the Met implemented a 'street bail' system, which has previously been used at large environmental protests.
The force used two 'prisoner processing points' in Westminster to deal with 320 protesters, who were asked to confirm their details before being released and ordered to appear at a police station at a future date.
Protesters were given conditions not to attend demonstrations related to Palestine Action, although video online suggested some of those who were released on bail then returned to Parliament Square. The police said it would have been impractical to try to re-arrest those who returned to the area.
'Given the numbers of people arrested yesterday it would have been entirely unrealistic for officers to recognise individuals who returned,' they said. 'Their focus was rightly on those continuing to commit offences who were still to be arrested. We are as confident as we can be that none of those who returned to Parliament Square rejoined the protesters who were holding placards.'
Palestine Action said that its goal was to overwhelm the police.
Huda Ammori, who co-founded the group, said the number of arrests was a 'farcical waste of police resources'.
She said: 'This will go down in our country's history as a momentous act of collective defiance of an unprecedented attack on our fundamental freedoms, taken straight from the playbook of authoritarian regimes which abuse counter-terrorism laws to curb rights to free expression and protest.'
Defend Our Juries, a civil liberty group which organised the protest on Saturday, said it was planning to hold further demonstrations — in support of free speech rather than Palestine Action specifically — in early September.
• A history of Palestine Action: from birth to ban
Tim Crosland, a co-founder of Defend Our Juries, said: 'Already we're hearing from hundreds of people wanting to take part in the next one, so expecting it to be even bigger.
'People are now seeing an arrest for terrorism as a badge of honour for resistance to genocide.'
Among those arrested at Saturday's protest were 212 who refused to provide their details or were found to have broken previous bail conditions, and were transported to police stations in the capital. At least 18 remained in custody over night.
Downing Street said that it would expect charges to be brought against anyone breaking the law. The decision is likely to be taken by Lord Hermer, the attorney-general, who decides on prosecutions in terrorism cases. However, most are expected to be dealt with via fines in the magistrates courts.
Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, said that while the right to protest was 'fiercely' protected this was 'very different from displaying support for this one specific and narrow proscribed organisation'.
'Palestine Action was proscribed based on strong security advice following serious attacks the group has committed, involving violence, significant injuries and extensive criminal damage,' she said. 'Many people may not yet know the reality of this organisation, but the assessments are very clear — this is not a non-violent organisation. UK national security and public safety must always be our top priority.'
Among those detained were Sir Jonathon Porritt, a former government adviser when Sir Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were in office, who said it was a 'privilege' to be arrested.
Most of the arrests — 522 — were made for displaying an item in support of a proscribed organisation contrary to section 13 of the Terrorism Act 2000. Hundreds of protesters had held up handwritten placards bearing the slogan: 'I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.'
The number of arrests exceeds the total for all terrorism-related activity last year, recorded by the Home Office as 248.
Anne Alexander, 50, a university researcher from London, was arrested at 1.50pm and held for nearly three hours at a processing point near Great Scotland Yard. She described police officers filling out paperwork at tables in marquees.
'They had people out in the street for hours, hundreds of them in a queue, having been arrested,' she said. 'If they were able to make an ID check to confirm name and home address, they were then bailing people to return to a police station in, in my case, October.'
Alexander described the processing point as like 'a factory assembly line' but said that the process was 'quite chaotic'. She claimed the officer arresting her had been confused about whether he was arresting her under the Public Order Act or Terrorism Act, at one point using an AI summary on his phone to show her the difference between two sections of the latter.
Polly Smith, 74, a retired care worker from Ipswich, was arrested within four minutes of the protest.
'I was sitting just in front of the Gandhi statue in Parliament Square,' she said. '[My sign] said 'I oppose genocide. I support Palestine action'.'
Smith was originally taken to a processing point but was then moved to Kentish Town police station until about 9pm, nearly eight hours after her arrest.
Organisers of the weekend demonstration claimed that Saturday was the 'largest mass arrest' on one day in the Met's history, exceeding the 339 arrested for protesting against the poll tax on March 31, 1990.
The Met was not able to confirm the historical arrest figures but said that a recent record was the 306 arrested on October 7, 2019, at an Extinction Rebellion protest.
On Armistice Day in 2023 the force arrested 145 people, the vast majority of whom were counter-protesters confronting a pro-Palestinian demonstration calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.
In April 2021, 107 people were arrested at a Kill the Bill protest against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill.
Nationwide, there have been many protests which have spread over multiple days and resulted in mass arrests. In 1982, 752 anti-nuclear protesters were arrested over four days at USAF Upper Heyford in Oxfordshire.