What is Palestine Action and why is the UK moving to ban it?

UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper on Monday moved to ban the Palestine Action activist group, after activists broke into Brize Norton, the biggest RAF base in the country, last week and damaged two military aircraft.

Palestine Action, which uses direct action to protest Israeli oppression, called the UK government's move to proscribe the movement as a terrorist organisation, alongside the likes of the Islamic State group, preposterous, with supporters rallying outside Parliament to oppose the ban.

Cooper said she will present a draft proscription order in Parliament next week, which, if passed, will make it illegal to be a member or supporter of Palestine Action under Britain’s Terrorism Act of 2000.

Who are Palestine Action and what do they stand for?

Founded by Huda Ammori and Richard Barnard in 2020, Palestine Action seeks to challenge UK complicity in Israel’s occupation and oppression in the Gaza Strip and West Bank.

The group has become known for using direct action tactics such as vandalism, occupation of premises, and protest at several sites across the UK, particularly aimed at Elbit Systems, Israel's largest weapons manufacturer.

Ammori is a graduate of the University of Manchester and is of Palestinian and Iraqi heritage. Her family was forced out of their home by the Israeli military in 1967. She became one of the UK’s most prominent figures in pro-Palestinian activism after co-founding the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) group at Manchester University.

Barnard is a left-wing activist and a former member of the Christian anarchist Catholic Worker movement, with a track record of pro-Palestinian activism and opposition to the US military.

Palestine Action describes itself as a "grassroots, horizontally-led direct-action network focused on getting concrete results", vowing to "take action against complicit companies and pressure institutions to divest from them".

On 30 July 2020, in its first direct action, Palestine Action activists reportedly broke into the UK headquarters of Elbit Systems and spray-painted its interior.

The group has since expanded, targeting Elbit sites across the UK, including factories in Oldham, Kent, Bristol, and Leicester.

It has claimed responsibility for around 300 incidents in the UK, including actions at universities, Elbit factories, and other defence facilities linked to Israel.

Most of the group's actions have been in response to Israeli assaults on Gaza, with one notable protest in 2021 when activists climbed the headquarters of Elbit, claiming the direct action led to the site being "shut down".

In the same year, four members of Palestine Action dressed in boiler suits climbed onto the roof of an Elbit-owned drone factory in Leicester in response to Israel’s war on Gaza, which killed 256 Palestinians.

In April 2024, the group targeted Somerset County Hall, a Grade II-listed building owned by Somerset Council, by splashing it with red paint in protest at the council leasing a building to Elbit near Bristol.

In November of that year, the group removed statues of Israel's first president, Chaim Weizmann, from the University of Manchester's premises on the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, in which UK Foreign Minister Arthur Balfour pledged to establish "a national home for the Jewish people" on Palestinian land in 1917.

The group has also poured fake blood over statues of Lord Balfour, a highly controversial figure in Palestinian history.

Their targeting of Brize Norton last weekend was due to daily flights leaving the RAF airbase for Akrotiri in Cyprus, a site used in military operations in Gaza and across the Middle East.

Palestine Action’s tactics have reportedly caused over £200 million in property damage, and led to the closure of two Elbit factories and the abandonment of its London headquarters following sustained direct actions.

The group has refrained from using violent tactics against individuals, although two police officers were reportedly assaulted with a sledgehammer in an incident in Gloucestershire.

No other incidents involving harm to individuals have been documented.

Ammori, a frequent contributor to The New Arab, said of the group's actions: "To build a movement strong enough to bring down all ten of Elbit’s sites in Britain, we had to be both disruptive and sustained. One-off actions weren’t going to cut it. Every minute we didn’t act was a minute for Elbit to make another killing. In order to defeat them, we had to bombard them."

In an interview with Prospect, Ammori acknowledged that activists “could end up in jail” if “you do these types of actions.”

Legal trouble

Co-founder Richard Barnard was arrested in 2023 on charges of expressing support for a proscribed organisation, in violation of Section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

The arrest was linked to a protest held the day after Hamas's surprise attack on southern Israel in October 2023, which killed around 1,200 people and triggered the ongoing war in Gaza, where at least 55,000 Palestinians have since been killed.

Several members of the group have been jailed, including William Plastow, Ellie Kamio, and Zoe Rogers, after members of Palestine Action stormed an Elbit manufacturing hub in Bristol, dismantling Israeli weapons.

Members of the so-called Filton 18 are still awaiting trial.