Declassified UK: Palestine Action fights back against terrorism ban
Posted: 2nd July 2025
This week, the Home Office issued a proscription order for Palestine Action, an activist group which targets weapons factories and other businesses associated with the Israeli arms trade.
The order came a week after Palestine Action activists broke into RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire and sprayed paint into the engines of two Voyager aerial refuelling aircraft.
Brize Norton has been used to onward service RAF Akrotiri, Britain’s airbase in Cyprus which has been used to provide intelligence and logistical support to Israel amid the Gaza genocide.
One of the two planes targeted by Palestine Action was used to support US and UK airstrikes on Yemen in February 2024, which were conducted in no small part to shield Israel from the consequences of its genocide in Gaza.
Palestine Action said after the incident that the group had “directly intervened in the genocide and prevented crimes against the Palestinian people”.
UK home secretary Yvette Cooper disagreed, announcing that the attack amounted to “unacceptable criminal damage” such that the group’s activities now “meet the threshold… established by the Terrorism Act 2000”.
The UK government has been looking for ways to crack down on Palestine Action since it was founded in 2020, but proscription under the Terrorism Act was previously viewed as too extreme.
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Home Office officials admitted in 2022 that Palestine Action “engage in civil disobedience and direct action” but do “not meet the threshold for proscription as they do not commit” or “encourage… acts of terrorism”.
What changed?
Three factors can account for the UK government’s dramatic change in stance.
First, the humiliation of activists on e-scooters entering the RAF’s busiest airbase amid heightened global tensions. Second, the furious reaction from the right-wing political and media establishment as the Labour party is haemorrhaging support to Reform UK.
And third, pressure from the pro-Israel lobby, which has been angling for the proscription of Palestine Action for years. Indeed, the order was reportedly inspired by We Believe in Israel, a pressure group whose former director, Luke Akehurst, is currently a Labour MP.
There will be a debate and vote on the proscription of Palestine Action in the House of Commons on Wednesday evening, followed by a debate and vote in the House of Lords on Thursday. But Palestine Action is fighting back.
The group’s co-founder, Huda Ammori, has been given an opportunity to apply for “interim relief” with respect to the proscription order. This will be heard in the high court on Friday morning and, if successful, it would have the effect of suspending the order’s operation.
A group of UN experts including special rapporteur on terrorism Ben Saul have also weighed in. They said: “According to international standards, acts of protest that damage property, but are not intended to kill or injure people, should not be treated as terrorism”.
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