In November 2023, four UN Special Rapporteurs (part of Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council) pointed out that the worldwide climate of criminalisation and sanctions against those speaking out on Gaza/Israel stifles free expression and creates an atmosphere where people may fear participating in public life, ‘particularly when solidarity with victims is equated with support for terrorism’. The decision by the home secretary to proscribe Palestine Action flies in the face of the advice of these UN experts (who represent the fields of freedom of expression, cultural and education rights, freedom of peaceful assembly and association) and their warning that actions aimed at stopping a genocide should not be criminalised.
Non-violent direct action, such as that carried out by the Suffragettes, has been a feature of British life for centuries. If Parliament and the courts ratify the home secretary’s proscription of Palestine Action, the organisation will become the first non-violent direct action protest group ever to be banned in the UK. Proscribing an organisation that supports Palestinian aspirations to self-determination (as recognised in the UN Charter and many UN General Assembly Resolutions) and is committed to non-violent direct action to prevent a bigger crime – the crime of genocide – would send a strong signal to the world that genocide and racism against Palestinians is endorsed by the British state. Genocide, by its very definition, is targeted action aimed at the destruction of particular groups of people – it is the worst crime against a people that can be committed.
In this sense, we regard the decision by the home secretary to proscribe Palestine Action as motivated by anti-Palestinian racism, a form of anti-Arab racism that aims to silence, exclude, erase, stereotype or defame Palestinians and their narratives, and criminalise anyone who associates with the Palestinian cause. The use of counter-terrorism language, legislation and charges against those protesting the UK’s involvement in the Palestinian genocide in Gaza is a grave insult to the Palestinian diaspora in the UK. The ban will discourage them from speaking out and acting in solidarity with their own people out of a fear of falling foul of broadly defined terror offences which carry custodial sentences of up to 14 years. The same chilling effect will be felt across civil society. Employers and public sector workers, too, will be made to monitor pro-Palestine sentiment and make referrals to the Prevent programme, turning the Palestinian diaspora – and anyone who supports their struggle – into even more of a suspect community, and driving them further out of public life.
The proposed ban is already fostering an atmosphere hostile to pro-Palestine sentiment. In a statement on 22 June 2025 ahead of a peaceful protest in Trafalgar Square, Met Commissioner Mark Rowley described Palestine Action as an ‘organised extremist criminal group’ and labelled the protest as illegitimate per se. Such language, soon to be backed up by legislation, gives licence to heavy-handed policing against non-violent protesters, and invites further demonisation of the Palestinian cause by politicians and the media, as well as street-level harassment and violence from the far Right and those who hold anti-Palestinian views. Beyond that, current and future governments may use the proscription of Palestine Action as a precedent to attack other groups in future, further shrinking the already limited civic and political space for those who engage in pro-Palestine and anti-genocide activity, despite public opinion in the UK and international law being on their side.