My view about the Government’s hasty decision to designate Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation was disproportionate and unwarranted.

It is saying the people who damage property to protest about Britain’s armed support for Israel are equivalent to the Manchester Arena concert bomber who set out to kill and maim as many people he could enjoying a pop concert. This is plainly a ridiculous comparison. If the authorities want to take action against people who damage planes there are already plenty of laws in this country from criminal trespass to criminal damage that could be used. And it is absurd to say anybody peacefully demonstrating in favour of this organisation should go to jail for 14 years.

So unusually I have given space to one of our local people to describe her feelings about being arrested and bailed for demonstrating in front of Ghandi’s statute in Parliament Square last week. She has distributed this to Quakers and I thought it deserved a wider audience. She has not been charged with anything yet so it is reasonable to report this. Journalists who follow the law more closely than me say the fact she hasn’t been charged is because it will have been referred to the Crown Prosecution Service to consider what to do as there are lesser charges that can be brought. Many of the people arrested were elderly and likely to die in prison if the full terrorism sentence was served.

Here is Sue Hampton’s tale:

I was arrested on July 5 at the feet of Gandi’s statute

I was arrested on Saturday 5^th July at the feet of the Gandhi statue in Parliament Square, along with three Christian Climate Action friends, among more than twenty others. We were arrested under Section 13 of the Terrorism Act, within hours of the proscription of Palestine Action, for holding a placard that read I OPPOSE GENOCIDE (and) I SUPPORT PALESTINE ACTION. When interviewed at a police station I told the solicitor that I would like, in answer to each question, to say, “I am a lifelong pacifist, a Quaker and follower of Jesus.” Emotionally I regret to say I took his advice and stuck with “No Comment”. After being kept twelve hours I wasn’t charged but given bail conditions and told to report back to Wandsworth Police Station on October 2^nd. In my cell I experienced unusually deep peace as well as profound grief.

Palestine Action is a nonviolent direct action group. The Filton 18, still on remand many months after blockading an arms factory, and those who recently disabled a fighter jet with paint, believe in peace and justice. Many Friends will remember Sam Waldron taking a similar action at an RAF base and being acquitted, and before that, the Ploughshares women who damaged a plane destined for East Timor. My own first arrest some years back was for locking on with two other Quakers to block the road to the London Arms Fair. UNICEF says that 50,000 children have been killed or injured in Gaza, yet our government continues to support Israel by supplying parts for missiles, by sharing military intelligence and training Israeli soldiers – while refusing to condemn the war crimes of Netanyahu’s government as genocide. Incredibly, thirteen members of the UK Cabinet, including Keir Starmer, Yvette Cooper and David Lammy, have received gifts from that government.

By lumping Palestine Action together with two violent organisations in the proscription bill, our own government skewed the vote. I seriously believe that the outcome would have been different had our MPs been voting separately on each group. Indeed, my own MP has implied that under those circumstances she would have made a different decision. This is not justice. It isn’t honourable. Like the BBC’s biased new coverage and their decision not to show the documentary they commissioned on medics being targeted in Gaza, it’s wrong.

That’s why I took a spare placard on Saturday and sat with my principled activist friends. I hadn’t been allocated one, and if asked in advance I might, or might not, have been daunted by the potential custodial sentence (up to 14 years) but I wanted to support the protest with a badge. Will people be arrested for wearing badges or T-shirts in support of Palestine Action, for sharing posts on social media, for using any public platform to speak the truth that proscribing a nonviolent protest group is unjust? Although an immediate appeal failed to prevent the law being passed, I do believe that the proscription will eventually be declared unlawful. More importantly, a peaceful resolution to the conflict may yet be found, and the real terror will end.