6 days ago
The ban on Palestine Action is to scare folk into passivity
Most professionals and papers are distancing themselves from the 'terrorist' group Palestine Action (PA), and thus – to be on the safe side – from the whole genocide in Gaza. But others are stepping forward to highlight the most serious assault on our freedoms since the Diplock Courts sat without juries in Northern Ireland during the 1980s.
Back then, bombings and assassinations killed many. Now, paint has been thrown and railings crashed. It's hardly a parallel.
But Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper are throwing the book at anyone who dares combine the words Palestine and action in the same sentence or T-shirt. Maybe.
READ MORE: Man-made famine in Gaza 'most severe' since Second World War, expert warns
As Raza Husain KC argued at the PA appeal in London on Monday, there is 'rampant uncertainty' in the aftermath of a ban which carries 'all the hallmarks of an authoritarian and blatant abuse of power'.
Obviously, that's the intention. To scare folk into passivity.
It's a shameful, cowardly strategy that mustn't be normalised or meekly accepted, tempting as it is to conform.
Three people who attended Edinburgh's Palestine Solidarity march on Saturday were arrested days after Sean Clerkin in Glasgow. It's not totally clear what their 'offences' were, but holding a sign; 'Genocide in Palestine, time to take action' was enough to get Sean lifted.
Meanwhile, Kent Police threatened a woman with the Terrorism Act for a sign that read 'Free Gaza' without any reference to PA. How was that an arrestable offence?
Meanwhile, three folk with more profile – Alba leader Kenny MacAskill, former SNP MP Tommy Sheppard and myself – said the same thing last Saturday in Edinburgh. Indeed, I was filmed saying the words 'Palestine needs action', with at least six police in view and 3000-4000 people roaring their approval.
Now, I'm not trying to court arrest. It's a scary prospect. Supporting PA means up to six months in prison. Being a member of the group can mean up to 14 years in jail.
And the real heroes are not here in the UK but trailing Gaza every day, searching for safety and scavenging for food with hope and dignity almost completely stripped away.
It's that tiny shred of hope any person of conscience must feel obliged to nurture.
But not our MPs. In a Commons' vote three weeks ago – where the SNP shamefully abstained on account of PA being bunched with other groups – 385 MPs voted to ban the group. It's important to note this was the first time a non-violent direct action campaign group has ever been proscribed.
Where's the reaction?
READ MORE: Labour are creating uncertainty and acting against democratic freedom
Here in Scotland, why has there not been a peep from Scotland's justice minister about the justice of arresting T-shirt-wearing protesters?
Will the Lord Advocate clarify that talking about action for Palestine will not be considered a terrorist offence in Scotland – whatever politicians south of the Border advise.
Indeed, while we're at it, why doesn't John Swinney make this the subject of a follow-up event on the dangers of the far-right in public life?
Yes, I realise the Terrorism Act is a reserved issue and Holyrood can't change or duck it.
But our law officers and government ministers can produce guidance on what actions constitute support for terrorists. Doing that means activists would be saved stress and jail, police would be saved time – as they tackle the private visit of Donald Trump – and the law would be saved from being an ass.
Scottish Government – you're allowed to have a view. You're allowed to protect your own citizens. And you're allowed to take a side, supporting peaceful campaigners who support the citizens of Gaza and the tradition of policing by consent.
In the absence of a distinctive Scottish stance though, some professionals are taking a side.
Like Blinne Nessa Áine Ní Ghrálaigh KC – the Irish human rights lawyer who led this week's legal challenge against PA's proscription in London. Clearly, from the stubborn retention of her full beautiful Irish name, she's not a gal who toes the line.
In 2017, she secured an acquittal for activists Sam Walton and Dan Woodhouse, arrested for trying to disarm Typhoon jets they believed were bound for Saudi Arabia to bomb Yemen.
Ní Ghrálaigh also represented one of the Colston Four charged with toppling the Colston statue in Bristol in 2020. The jury acquitted the protesters in January 2022, and The Times named Ní Ghrálaigh Lawyer of the Week. It's worth knowing such people exist.
Last year, Ní Ghrálaigh was part of the South African legal team at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which accused Israel of genocide. The court ordered Israel to observe the Genocide Convention, and enable basic services and humanitarian assistance.
As we all know, that hasn't happened. And the court did shrink from ordering Israel to stop its military campaign.
But the ICJ judgment was the first powerful international intervention against the IDF.
Then Ní Ghrálaigh pointed out that Gaza was the first genocide in history to be broadcast 'in real-time' with 'dehumanising genocidal rhetoric' used by Israeli governmental and military officials, including that 'terrible new' acronym WCNSFs (Wounded Child, No Surviving Family).
READ MORE: Doing the right thing for Gaza would gain the SNP more support
Ni Ghralaigh won 'Tatler Woman of the Year Award' in November after her ICJ intervention and dedicated it to the women of Palestine.
'The women of Palestine will build Gaza again from the rubble and destruction as they have before, like women do the world over.
'May the future finally be women-led. May it be led by brilliant, fierce, intelligent, and compassionate women like our mothers and grandmothers before us.'
This week, Ni Ghralaigh's words shocked again as she told the Royal Court of Justice that Merseyside Police have bailed protesters on condition they don't mention Palestine.
'People have been bailed to not mention Palestine?' Justice Chamberlain asked, with Ni Ghralaigh replying: 'It is a condition of bail that they do not mention Palestine.
'The Secretary of State has not distanced herself from any of these actions,' adding that Yvette Cooper had not even described such actions as an 'overreach'.
This is the fearless, clear-eyed interrogation needed to tackle Starmer's outrageous act of political censorship.
Where are the rest?
