The actions of Palestine Action may be treated as terrorism in forthcoming changes to the law. Now more than any other time in the last eighty years it is appropriate to read George Orwell,
or at least to think about the ideas that Orwell expounded. A non-violent, direct action movement may be branded a terrorist organisation on the power with ISIS for amongst other things spray-painting aeroplanes destined to play their part in war crimes in the Middle East and spraying "Gaza is not 4 sale" on one of Donald Trump's golf courses.
MPs are due to vote in the House of Commons on the draft proscription order for Palestine Action on Monday, 30th June, 2025, when the legislation will be formally laid before Parliament. If approved by MPs, the measure must then go through the House of Lords, and the ban is expected to come into force by around 4th July, 2025. Funny how legislation can be fast-tracked through Parliament when the British Government and MPs are still flapping around the issue of illegal and legal immigration into the UK which is bringing in real terrorists.
Real terrorists are the type of terrorists that actually commit terrorism, and, not as we are supposed to believe, take actions which ultimately prevent war or at least hamper the process towards war. In 2022, 19 individuals suspected of having links to terrorism entered the UK through small boats across the English Channel, from countries such as Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Afghanistan, and Libya. All are now under surveillance. So they're not proscribed.
They're just under surveillance which I'm sure our understaffed and underfunded intelligence agencies are handling as best they can, with a stiff upper lip, no doubt. Former Immigration Minister, Robert Jenrick, has stated that “dozens” of known terror suspects - linked to ISIS and al‑Qa’ida - crossed via this route up to the end of 2022. So not proscribed when reaching the shores of the UK, but put on some type of watch list - as was allegedly the Manchester Bomber, Salman Abedi. A Home Office committee revealed that more than 230 individuals flagged by MI5 as suspected terrorists, have entered - and remained - in the UK under asylum status. So nothing to fear here and not a proscription in sight for these individuals.
The British Government also has no restraint in its actual support of terrorism around the world seen recently in its support of "moderate opposition" against the former Assad government. Orwell again springs to mind as no one can possibly define "moderate" in this context, but just the term necessary to convince the very gullible that they don't have to look up from the latest, trending, cute kitten video suggested by the algorithmic recommendation systems and user behaviour analysis.
Louis Shawcross, Co. Down.
Louis Shawcross, Royal Hillsborough, Co. Down, N. Ireland
Photo by OwenBlacker, Wikimedia commons.