PALESTINE ACTION activists who occupied a weapons factory to disrupt weapon productions for Israel in Shipley are set to go on trial on Monday.
The four activists were charged with criminal damage after they were seen scaling and taking a sledgehammer to the roof of the US-owned Teledyne Defence and Space factory on April 2.
The factory manufactures components for missiles, electronics, gunsights and munitions for the Israeli military.
Operations were ground to a halt as a result of the action.
Two out of four activists were remanded to prison afterwards.
One was held for approximately one month, while the other was held for three months.
Palestine Action says the firm “boasts of its involvement with missile products procured by Israel, including the AGM-Harpoon, AIM-120 AMRAAM and AGM-114 Hellfire missiles deployed by Israel against Gaza — the latter reportedly being used to strike al-Shifa hospital.”
It also produces parts, including filters and multifunction assemblies for drones and aircraft, along with radar systems such as the type fitted in F-35 Fighter jets used by Israel.
Members of Israeli forces prepare to enter in an armoured vehicle during a military operation in the West Bank refugee camp of Nur Shams, Tulkarem, August 29, 2024
CAMPAIGNERS are demanding that Britain stops arming Israel’s genocide against Palestinians amid Tel Aviv’s largest military assault on the West Bank in more than two decades.
Hundreds of ground troops, supported by fighter planes and drones, began targeting Jenin, Tulkarem, Nablus, and Tubas early on Wednesday.
Soldiers have besieged hospitals in Jenin and Tulkarm, while bulldozers have destroyed roads and razed critical infrastructure, including water and electricity networks.
Several refugee camps have also been targeted.
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Ministers have so far rejected calls to suspend arms, instead issuing 108 licences to Israel since it escalated its attacks in October.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy has refrained from publishing legal advice on whether the exports are being used to facilitate international war crimes.
Deputy director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign Simon Foster said: “This is the largest Israeli invasion of the Palestinian territories in the West Bank since 2002.
“Israel’s Minister of Foreign Affairs has openly called for the forcible displacement of Palestinians.
UK Labour Party Shadow Foreign Secretary repeatedly heckled at a speech to the Fabian Society over his and the Labour Party’s support for and complicity in Israel’s genocide of Gaza.
A photo shows a World Food Program vehicle damaged by Israeli gunfire. (Photo: World Food Program)
“This is totally unacceptable and the latest in a series of unnecessary security incidents that have endangered the lives of WFP’s team in Gaza.”
The World Food Program said Wednesday that it was forced to suspend the movement of its employees in Gaza after the Israeli military fired on one of the United Nations agency’s teams as its clearly marked vehicle advanced toward an Israeli checkpoint in the Palestinian enclave.
The agency said in a statement that the WFP team was returning from a mission with two armored vehicles “after escorting a convoy of trucks carrying humanitarian cargo routed to Gaza’s central area.”
“Despite being clearly marked and receiving multiple clearances by Israeli authorities to approach, the vehicle was directly struck by gunfire as it was moving towards an Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) checkpoint,” WFP said. “It sustained at least ten bullets: five on the driver’s side, two on the passenger side, and three on other parts of the vehicle. None of the employees onboard were physically harmed.”
While the WFP’s statement doesn’t explicitly attribute the gunfire to Israeli forces, U.N. spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric told reporters Wednesday that the food agency’s vehicle was “struck 10 times by IDF gunfire, including with bullets targeting front windows.”
Cindy McCain, WFP’s executive director, said the attack was “totally unacceptable and the latest in a series of unnecessary security incidents that have endangered the lives of WFP’s team in Gaza.”
“As last night’s events show, the current deconfliction system is failing and this cannot go on any longer,” said McCain. “I call on the Israeli authorities and all parties to the conflict to act immediately to ensure the safety and security of all aid workers in Gaza.”
The Israeli military’s latest attack on aid workers in Gaza came as famine continued to spread across the strip, which Israel has strangled with a blockade that has restricted the flow of food and other necessities.
Kenneth Roth, the former executive director of Human Rights Watch, characterized the WFP attack as part of “Israel’s starvation strategy.” Israeli forces have repeatedly targeted humanitarian workers in Gaza, making the enclave the most dangerous place in the world for aid agency employees.
Chef José Andrés, the founder of a nonprofit whose Gaza team came under deadly attack by Israeli forces earlier this year, expressed solidarity with the WFP in a social media post late Wednesday.
No NGO employees or civilians or press corps can be never ever be targeted by anyone while delivering humanitarian aid! My support to @WFP @WFPChief @UN for their efforts and proud that we’ve work side by side in many countries! https://t.co/jl2hzplsyB
WFP did not say how long its pause on employee movement would stay in place, but any disruption to the agency’s humanitarian operations could be disastrous for starving Palestinians.
In its statement Wednesday, the U.N. food agency said that Israel’s “frequent and ongoing evacuation orders continue to uproot both families and food relief operations intended to support them.”
“Last week, WFP lost access to its third and last operational warehouse in Gaza’s middle area, while five of WFP’s operated community kitchens had to be evacuated,” the agency said. “This week, on Sunday 25 August, the evacuation orders impacted the main WFP operating hub in Deir al-Balah, forcing our team to relocate for the third time since the war started.”
IOF attacks in Al-Fara’a Camp in Tubas. Photo: Wafa News Agency
Israel continues to close all possible doors to a ceasefire in Gaza and de-escalation in the West Asia region, intensifying military operations and provocations in the West Bank and Gaza
The Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) launched the largest military operation across the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, August 27, aiming at crushing the Palestinian armed resistance groups. According to Israeli media outlets, the operation is the largest assault carried out by the Israeli military since 2002 at the peak of the Second Intifada. The operation involves hundreds of Israeli ground soldiers, warplanes, drones, and bulldozers.
On Tuesday night, the IOF ordered the residents of Nour Shams refugee camp, in the city of Tulkarm north of the West Bank to evacuate the camp. Israeli forces also established a military checkpoint to search the residents before leaving. The IOF has resorted to similar evacuation orders in the Gaza strip during the 11-month Israeli genocidal aggression on the Palestinian people there.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz wrote on X on Wednesday, August 28, “We must deal with the threat just as we deal with the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, including the temporary evacuation of Palestinian residents and whatever steps are required. This is a war for everything and we must win it.”
Katz added regarding the expanded operation, which the IOF carried out in the cities of Jenin and Tulkarm overnight, that the Israeli military has been working “to thwart Islamic-Iranian terror infrastructure that was set up there.”
The large-scale Israeli military operation that started on Tuesday night is intended to continue for several days, according to media reports. The operation also included the West Bank cities of Nablus, Tubas and Ramallah. At least 10 people have been killed in the last 24 hours. The death toll in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, has surpassed 660 people since October 7 attacks.
While storming different parts of the West Bank, the IOF has been committing flagrant violations of human rights against civilians and medical staff. According to the Palestinian News and Information Agency Wafa, the Israeli military seized the house of Palestinian resident Hamada Odeh Al-Barghouthi in the town of Beit Rima, northwest of Ramallah since Tuesday night. They turned the house into a field investigation center and a military barracks, where a number of Palestinian young men from the town, neighboring towns and villages have been detained.
The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) also reported that the IOF stormed a medical facility in the Al-Far’a refugee camp south of the city of Tubas, and detained and assaulted its staff, while shooting live ammunition inside the facility.
As Israeli incursions have been taking place in the West Bank, the massacres in Gaza and elsewhere in the region have not stopped. On Wednesday, August 28, IOF struck the Al-Manfalouti school, where displaced people were sheltering in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza strip, killing at least 8 Palestinians and injuring several others. At least 4 people have been killed in an Israeli air strike that targeted a car in Syria near the border with Lebanon. The Israeli Army claimed that Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement’s top commander Faris Qasim was killed in the attack, without any confirmation by Islamic Jihad that Faris could have been assassinated.
Home Office continues appeal against Liberty’s successful legal challenge to anti-protest rules, which the High Court had previously found unlawful
Legislation gave police ‘almost-unlimited’ powers to impose conditions on protests that caused ‘more than minor’ disruption.
Liberty said “We will ensure a government is not allowed to wilfully ignore the rules at the expense of our fundamental human rights”
The human rights organisation Liberty has questioned the new Government’s “concerning disregard for the rule of law” as the Home Office has instructed lawyers to proceed with an appeal against a recent High Court ruling that anti-protest legislation had been created unlawfully.
The legislation, which significantly reduced the threshold at which the police could impose almost-unlimited conditions on protests to anything that they deemed caused ‘more than minor disruption’, had been brought in by then Home Secretary Suella Braverman in June 2023. Previously the threshold had been set at anything that caused ‘serious disruption’.
Liberty challenged the legislation in court, arguing that it was unlawful since it had already been democratically rejected by Parliament just a few months earlier, and was subsequently brought in “via the back door” through ‘secondary legislation’, which required less Parliamentary scrutiny and debate.
In May 2024, the High Court agreed with Liberty’s arguments, ruling that “more than minor cannot mean serious”. The Court also found that the Government had failed to undertake a fair consultation period, instead only inviting thoughts from those it knew would be supportive of its proposals, such as the police but not protest groups.
The previous Government had lodged an appeal against the ruling, and despite requesting an adjournment and meeting to discuss the regulations, the new Government has now decided to continue the appeal. The appeal hearing is expected to take place later in the year.
