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The gun-toting Palestine Action activist who says ‘resistance is not terrorism'
An Al-Yassin 105 is an anti-armour missile developed by Hamas. Named after the terrorist group's spiritual leader, Ahmed Yassin, it was first used in October 2023 against the Israeli army following the October 7 attacks.
A powerful weapon, it was reportedly based on a Russian rocket and modified by Hamas to go from an armoured vehicle destroyer to be able to destroy the Israeli Merkava tank.
Strange, then, to find its name co-opted on social media by a man called Paul from Dumfries. It's less incongruous, however, when you delve a little deeper and find an interest in both weaponry and pro-Palestine activism that appears to extend beyond an Instagram handle.
Paul Shortt is a Scottish activist and member of Palestine Action, the group which now stands to be proscribed as a terrorist group. Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, said on Monday she would lay an order to make support for the group illegal before Parliament next week.
It was reported this week that he has previously posed with a gun. The Times published a picture which had been posted on Shortt's Instagram. It appeared to show his finger on the trigger. Seeming to invoke the Hamas missile by using the handle @yassin105_73, Shortt wrote: 'Resistance is not terrorism! Resistance is justified. When people are occupied. Resist! By any means necessary.'
Shortt, who bears a tattoo of a red triangle on his middle finger – a symbol often used by groups such as Hamas – posted photographs wearing a shirt in the colours of the Palestinian flag and holding a pistol across his chest, the paper reported. In another photo, posted in March, he appears to hold a gun over a keffiyeh. Over the post a song called Intifada plays, the lyrics of which include a reference to 'a fascist settler entity on a killing spree'. The track is by the rapper Lowkey, who has been criticised by Sir William Shawcross, whose independent review of the Prevent counterterrorism scheme alleged his lyrics promoted 'what I regard to be an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory about the 'Zionist lobby''.
Shortt's Instagram account is listed as no longer available and it is not clear whether the gun in either photograph is real or an imitation. But whether or not he was indeed holding a weapon, the posts seem to send a clear message: when it comes to this brand of activism, violence is part of the process.
Direct action
Shortt certainly seems to have proved himself to be a useful foot soldier for Palestine Action. The group prides itself on direct action – last week, two of its members broke into RAF Brize Norton under the cover of darkness, damaging two military aircraft in a major breach of national security – and its supporters have been imprisoned for their activism, which has included targeting banks, universities and insurance firms.
For his part, Shortt received a suspended 23-month sentence last year for property damage and burglary. Then 50 and living on the outskirts of Dumfries, it was a conviction he earned alongside several other campaigners from the group. On May 15 2022, he was one of seven activists who broke into the Bristol HQ of Elbit Systems UK, an international defence technology company. Palestine Action claims Elbit supplies equipment to the Israeli army; in court, the company denied this. Shortt and his fellow protesters used sledgehammers to smash windows and barricaded themselves in. They caused thousands of pounds worth of damage and spray-painted walls and windows.
Lord Walney, who was the last government's independent adviser on political violence and disruption and was commissioned to conduct a review on the subject, recommended banning Palestine Action in 2024. He says there has been 'an edge of militant violent menace with Palestine Action's activities for a number of years'.
Having the group proscribed is 'overdue', he tells The Telegraph. As for the photograph, which appears to show Shortt holding a gun: 'It's a shocking image that clearly depicts a violent threat and it demonstrates that Palestine Action are trying to deceive people when they say that they are a harmless non-violent organisation.'
It's an image which might shock ordinary people, and it is behaviour like this which has led to politicians from both sides of the house to call for the group to be proscribed. But banning it has historically been difficult because 'the bar for full terrorist proscription is set very high', adds Lord Walney. 'You can have an organisation like this progressing for years, committing acts that fall under the definition of terrorism, they're dealt with through counter-terror police, but the system has judged thus far that you need an extremely high level of evidence for that full terror proscription.'
Twin causes
Shortt, 52, has tattooed the cause he is fighting for on his body. A big black tattoo extends from his wrist to his elbow – a filled-in map of the area in the region which some say should be Palestine and which includes the state of Israel. The Times reported he had also posted pictures of pro-Israel campaigners with red triangles over them – the symbol which has come to denote Hamas's targets.
On X, an account which appears to belong to Shortt, bearing the same handle – @Yassin105_73 – has the Palestinian flag, the flag of Lebanon and the Saltire in the bio, along with two red arrows. 'Join the resistance,' he writes, with a link to join Palestine Action Scotland. There are also links to direct action training days, a Zoom link to join a 'crash course' on direct action, and to support funds for Palestine Action members who are on trial or who have been imprisoned. The profile picture is a man in a black and white balaclava with a keffiyeh print. The geolocation has him not in Dumfries but in 'Occupied Scotland'.
Scottish independence appears to be a twin cause for Shortt. Last year, he appeared to comment under a post by Reform UK MP Lee Anderson using the hashtag '#SNLA', the acronym often used by the so-called Scottish National Liberation Army, a paramilitary group nicknamed the Tartan Terrorists. The group fell by the wayside in the early 2000s after being condemned by the UK government and the SNP.
While many have come to pro-Palestine activism by way of Extinction Rebellion, Shortt's campaigning seems to dovetail with his alliance with his home country. 'I'm Scottish, I know about colonialism, I know about land grabs, about ethnic cleansing,' he told The Electronic Intifada ahead of his sentencing last year. 'We used to do supposedly 'democratic' protests, it just didn't work. Direct action was the only way.'
To an observer scrolling back through the X account, he seems to display a consistent hatred for 'Zionists'. 'You're a Zionist, not a Jew,' he appeared to say in a post addressed to television presenter Rachel Riley in November 2023.
Last year, he seemingly published what he called the 'Zionist modus operandi' – namely 'murder, torture, rape, steal'. On the day of the October 7 attacks, the account posted a cartoon with a red fist breaking out of chains emblazoned with the Israeli flag. 'Long live the resistance. From Scotland to Gaza.'
A day later, the account posted a picture of Shortt raising his tattooed arm and making a fist against the backdrop of a Palestinian flag. Hours later, it also posted an image of the Israeli flag with the word 'Terrorism' across it in red lettering.
More recently, the account which appears to belong to Shortt has focused on retweeting inflammatory posts. A video of students at the University of Manchester shows people protesting 'UoM's complicity in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians'. Another shows a woman crying after losing her house in Tel Aviv. The post retweeted by Shortt reads: 'Zero empathy. If you don't wanna lose your house, don't live on stolen lands where you pay tax to a genocidal regime.'
History of activism
Shortt's activism doesn't appear to have always been quite so aggressive. In 2018, he wrote a letter which was published in Scottish newspaper The National. 'Are we to leave the Palestinians to stand alone, as they fight for their freedom and basic human rights in their own land?' he wrote.
'We, as a country, as people of conscience, have a duty to build and implement effective and immediate solidarity with Palestine. As Desmond Tutu said: 'If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.'' He signed it: Paul Shortt, Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign (Dumfries).
In 2021, he appears to have signed a letter sent to Arlene Foster, then first minister of Northern Ireland, about a doctor and Scottish Palestinian activist who was imprisoned in Northern Ireland during the pandemic and was suffering with health problems.
Since then, there is little trace of Shortt under his real name online, save for a photograph posted on Facebook last year by a clothing brand that makes Palestine football shirts.
'Paul K Shortt repping the new Toro Sportivo Saoirse Edition shirt', the post says. 'Paul who is part of Palestine Action Scotland commented 'beats any football shirt I've ever worn!'' Meanwhile, a picture of Shortt shows him looking sternly into the camera, his bicep flexed, his tattoo on full show.
