It was certainly not part of any life plan for my 70s that I should be facing a charge under the 2000 Terrorism Act. However, as one of the 532 arrested in Parliament Square on Saturday, under Section 13 of the Act, that is where I am. And it still seems vaguely surreal.
Section 13 relates to any public display indicating “that one is a member or supporter of a proscribed organisation” – in this case, Palestine Action.
Our alleged crime is that we were directly supporting Palestine Action by holding up a sign calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza and the reversal of home secretary Yvette Cooper’s dangerous decision to proscribe it as a terrorist organisation.
So I sat there, mostly in silence, for two and a half hours before being arrested. I spent a lot of time looking around at all those holding identical signs (“I oppose genocide: I support Palestine Action”), and on one occasion burst out laughing at the absurd idea that these calm, predominantly old or middle-aged, middle-class citizens are now seen by our government as linked to or even the equivalent of members of al-Qaeda, the IRA, Boko Haram or the Wagner Group.
One of the reasons why Mr Justice Chamberlain, sitting in the High Court on July 30, expedited the appeal by Palestine Action against its proscription (now to be heard in November) was that the home secretary failed to consult with any individual or organisation other than those who had been pressing for years for Palestine Action to be proscribed. Any sensible, non-partisan person could have told Yvette Cooper she was going to end up looking like a bit of a chump – and I bet you any money her civil servants did.
Even the government’s Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre’s assessment acknowledged that “Palestine Action does not advocate for violence against persons” – the very essence of terrorism.
Weirdly, what I was most upset by was not the behaviour of the police, which I personally – though others had a different experience – found to be uniformly courteous and attentive, but the behaviour of all the no doubt well-meaning non-sitters, screaming insults at the police as they carried out their duties in removing us from Parliament Square. “Shame on you, shame on you!” Shame on whom, I found myself asking?
Shame, primarily, on our government. I’m in no doubt whatsoever that this government will be found, in due course, to have been complicit in the genocide being carried out in Gaza today – not just through continuing arms sales to Israel, but in its reckless refusal to act on stated duties to prevent genocide under international law.
The vast majority of people here in the UK now see that genocide for what it really is. Seven days ago, a Jordanian flight to air-drop aid over Gaza revealed the full extent of the devastation wrought by Israel’s assault on Gaza over the last two years. Just 48 hours after that, the commemoration of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima 80 years ago reminded us of all of those terrible scenes. It was hard to tell the difference.
Yet, Cooper has doubled down on her determination to persuade us all that Palestine Action is a “violent organisation…. causing significant injury to an individual”. Apparently, she can’t reveal the evidence that lies behind that assertion because of national security.
Let’s be clear: it is not our national security that is at stake in this moment; it is the integrity of our ministers.
Palestine Action has proved to be the most effective organisation in laying bare the extent of the UK government’s complicity in the genocide in Gaza, through its direct action campaigning against some of the manufacturers of the weapons that are killing Palestinians day after bloody day.
Has property been damaged in the actions? Yes, it has. Has that damage been costly to those involved? Yes, it has.
That does not make Palestine Action a terrorist organisation, though. The government has so many other ways of prosecuting Palestine Action for what it has been doing, including criminal damage which already carries heavy penalties. But that would not have silenced Palestine Action.
Opposing genocide is not terrorism. That’s what brought all 532 of us to Parliament Square on Saturday, and I believe will now bring the whole country together.
Jonathon Porritt is a former environmental adviser to King Charles and author of Love, Anger & Betrayal: Just Stop Oil’s Young Climate Campaigners (Mount House Press, £9.99)
