High Court judge grants Palestine Action urgent hearing against Labour’s planned terror designation

Case on suspension of order will be heard before it goes into effect

The UK’s High Court has granted anti-genocide action group Palestine Action an urgent hearing this Friday for the group’s legal challenge against the Starmer government’s Israel-driven plan to proscribe (ban) it by designating it a terrorist group for its peaceful direct actions against Israel-linked arms factories and funders.

The Judge will be asked to order that the proscription order be suspended from taking effect until a full judicial review can be completed. If Starmer and his Home Secretary Yvette Cooper succeed in banning Palestine Action, it will be listed alongside groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda and membership of or support for the group will become a criminal offence carrying a sentence of up to fourteen years in prison.

The ban, which forms part of Israel-supporter Keir Starmer’s ‘lawfare’ misuse of terror legislation against peaceful protest against Israel’s slaughter of around 400,000 Palestinian civilians – and even against journalists who expose Israel’s crimes in Gaza,has been opposed by legal experts as a dangerous and anti-democratic precedent in designating a peaceful group that aims to prevent harm to people, not cause it, as ‘terrorist’ group to protect Israeli interests. Even Home Office officials have said there is deep concern in Cooper’s department about the ‘unworkable’ plan. Israel lobby groups have boasted about their influence in bringing about the proposed ban – unsurprisingly, since the Crown Prosecution Service has been exposed involving Israel in its decisions about cases to prosecute.

Opponents of the ban will mobilise outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London from 10.30am this Friday, 4th July.

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