https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/build-mass-campaign-overturn-palestine-action-ban

THE Court of Appeal decision to uphold the government’s absurd ban on Palestine Action as a “terrorist” group shows the need for a political revolt against the decree.

The definition of terrorism is being stretched to include any criminal damage to property done with a political motive, as we saw with Friday’s sentencing of the Filton Four. There, Mr Justice Johnson cited defendants’ aim to “influence the government” as evidence in favour of treating their attack on an arms factory belonging to Israeli firm Elbit Systems as a terrorist act.

The Court of Appeal is similarly sweeping. “The whole premise of Palestine Action is to cause damage to property,” it charges, before adding: “At no stage has Palestine Action suggested that its terrorist activities were either a mistake or an aberration.” “Damage to property” has by sleight of hand become “terrorist activities.”

Judges’ reference to the Suffragettes, in order to contrast their direct action to Palestine Action’s so-called terrorism, is again misleading; they state that the latter has “caused injury as well as property damage” (so did some Suffragette activities) and that its use of “secret cells to avoid … detection and prosecution” adds to the case for it being terrorist.

Elbit’s production of weapons used in a genocide against the Palestinians is described as “lawful business” despite the cases against Israel and Israeli leaders at the International Court of Justice and International Criminal Court. And speculation about future activities is given as much weight as anything that has actually been done (“The future threats and risks posed to third party individuals and property by Palestine Action are perhaps the most important factors … the home secretary is in the best position to assess those future threats and risks”).

All this simply shows that the courts are not a defence against authoritarian government.

Denying that the ban has had a chilling effect on freedom of protest, when police have arrested thousands of people for sitting down in public holding placards, is ludicrous; so is trusting ministers to tell the truth about groups they want to ban (the home secretary who pushed the ban through, Yvette Cooper, prepared the ground with baseless smears that Palestine Action might be funded by Iran).

Evidence-free froth about links to foreign states is doubly dangerous: it provides an excuse to suppress dissenting voices at home and raises international tensions when the risk of world war is again real, thanks in no small degree to the belligerence of our own government and its trigger-happy allies.

If the government cannot be turned from its repressive path judicially then this needs to happen politically. Even if Palestine Action can appeal to the Supreme Court, that won’t stop plans to give police powers to ban marches based on their “cumulative impact” or the prosecutions of peace movement leaders like Ben Jamal and Chris Nineham. We need a mass movement that forces ministers to back down.

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Original article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/build-mass-campaign-overturn-palestine-action-ban

Judges’ references to the Suffragettes are ridiculous. Are they suggesting that the Suffragettes didn’t plot secretly to kidnap cabinet ministers and subject them to forced feeding? Is it suggested that they published all their plans and intentions publicly so that here was no element of surprise? Are they saying that Suffragette bombers and arsonists campaigning for suffrage were not terrorists while Palestine Action opposing genocide are?

I consider that a horse crop whip only stings very briefly by the way, there is the crack of a whip but hardly painful and extremely short-lived, doesn’t leave any marks.