Author: germana

Today, bail was denied for three of the hunger strikers, as well another prisoner, all of whom are accused of taking part in the action against RAF Brize Norton, where two British military planes were painted red, to prevent their use in the Gaza genocide. Another hunger striker, Qesser Zuhrah, was also denied bail when her lawyers submitted an emergency application for bail due to her being hospitalised overnight.

The hunger strike, which involves eight prisoners for Palestine, is now on day 40. They are in the danger zone, where irreparable harm is likely, and their health
becomes critical. Each of them are accused of destroying the tools and weapons used to massacre the Palestinian people. For acting to stop a genocide, the state has locked them away for up to two years before they’re even afforded their right to a trial.

Even when their trial comes around, it will not be fair if their demands are not met. We know that crucial evidence which shows foreign and political interference in their cases is being redacted, evidence which clearly demonstrates an abuse of process.

Left with no other option to seek justice, the hunger strikers are using their bodies as a way to continue their resistance. Under the ‘duty of care’ of the state, they are coming physically weaker each day and David Lammy
has failed to bother responding to calls for a meeting with the legal representative of the hunger strikers.

This is an emergency. So far, as supporters of the strikes, we have appealed to the government, lobbied politicians, protested repeatedly, called the prisons and sent thousands of emails. They have ignored us. Now, it’s time to escalate.

It’s time to take inspiration from the prisoners themselves, and take direct action against the companies and institutions complicit in genocide. It’s time to hold to account the institutions responsible for imprisoning those who resist genocide.
Today, friends of hunger striker Amu Gib shut down the Ministry of Justice. Others blockaded the Kent factory of Israeli weapons firm Elbit Systems and just last night, protestors stormed the BBC headquarters. This is only the beginning of the escalation.

Our prisoners led the way, they sacrificed their liberty and they’ve sacrificed their health. Now it’s time to shut down all those complicit with the genocide, and with the repression of those who act against.

OPERATION RE-COMPLY is the documentary about activists currently imprisoned on remand (held without trial), for taking direct action to dismantle weapons at Elbit Systems, an Israeli arms factory in Bristol, as part of the now-proscribed group Palestine Action. This film tells the story of their families, their fight for justice, and the movement that’s grown with them.

After 16 months in prison, six of the Filton 24 are finally going on trial, while others may have to wait two years before finally having their day in court. Their loved ones have had their worlds turned upside down. Violent house raids and arrests, brutal prison conditions, and for the families, a lingering uncertainty of not knowing when—if ever—their loved ones will be home.

OPERATION RE-COMPLY documents the govt’s response—in collusion with Israel— to crush the pro-Palestine movement. Harsh measures like labelling nonviolent activists as ‘terrorists’, and how their families continue to fight back with resilience and love as the state escalates its crackdown on basic human rights.

“When they ask why I did it, I tell them about the children… But I never forget to say: It was love, not hate, that called me.” – Zoe, 21; one of the Filton 24

In the film, strangers transform grief into a community bound by love, support, and resistance.  We’ve seen over 2,500 arrests—many of them pensioners—simply for holding cardboards signs in support of Palestine Action. This is not just a story about the Filton 24; it’s a story about the growing attack on democracy and human rights, as the state uses terrorism laws to criminalise peaceful protest and free speech.

Take action at your local British Embassy or Consulate. Show them that the people stand with them around the world.

London

Royal Courts of Justice, London, WC2A 2LL

Tues, Nov 25th, 10am to 4pm

Join us outside court during the judicial review of the proscription of Palestine Action, to raises our voices for the prisoners.

Call to action posters

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Eighteen days since the start of the Prisoners For Palestine rolling, indefinite hunger-strike, and more than a month since the Home Secretary was notified of the prisoners’ intentions, and of their demands, there has still been no response from the British government. With the health of the six hunger-strikers already deteriorating, and the first of the Filton 24 trials finally beginning this week, a joint Prisoners For Palestine/CAGE International online press conference was held this morning.

Alongside Francesca Nadin, from Prisoners for Palestine, was Anas Mustapha, Head of Public Advocacy at CAGE International, barrister Franck Magennis (Riverway to the Sea), Palestinian/Egyptian film maker and activist Saeed Taji Farouky, Shahmina Alam, sister of Kamran Ahmed, of the Filton 24, and one of the Prisoners For Palestine hunger-strikers, and RAF Veteran Steve Masters, representing Defend Our Juries. There was also a solidarity statement from veteran activist Bernadette McAliskey.

Anas Mustapha of CAGE  was first to speak, expressing full support for all the prisoners, and to all those taking part in the hunger-strike. Urging the government to respond to the prisoners demands, Anas said that only one conclusion could be drawn from their lack of action: “Britain is more invested in enabling and defending a foreign entity’s genocide than in safeguarding the rights and safety of its citizens. As the lack of food begins to take its toll on those striking, the risk to their health increases by the day.”

This week saw the start of the first of the 3 Filton 24 trials at Woolwich Crown Court, with Zoe Rogers, Fatema Zainab (Ray) Rajwani, Jordan Devlin, Samuel Corner, and Charlotte ‘Lottie’ Head, accused of breaking into an Elbit Systems facility in Filton, Bristol, and causing damage to a weapons shipment due to be sent to the Israeli military, for use in Gaza. Elbit produces 85% of the deadly Quadcopter drones used to target civilians, particularly children, in the Gaza Genocide. The Filton 24 maintain that they have upheld international law, while it is Elbit, and the British government who are the criminals.

The Right to a Fair Trial is a key demand of the hunger-strikers. Not only were they violently arrested, and held as ‘terrorists’, despite not being charged with any terrorist offence, but all 6 activists now on trial have been held for more than a year already, with long waits still ahead for most of the other prisoners. There has, provably, been interference in the judicial process by the Israeli government, Elbit Systems, their biggest weapons maker, and the collusion of the British government, police, and Crown Prosecution Service, as well as the withholding of evidence. It is for this reason that the hunger-strikers are also demanding immediate bail.

This morning, Franck Magennis told the press conference: “The British State is wielding the blunt weapon of remand in custody, denying people bail to attack the anti-Zionist movement, and it’s most principled activists. Many of these comrades have spent years remanded on bail, and many people accused of offenses related to Palestine solidarity are likely to be acquitted by juries, formed of ordinary people, increasingly outraged at the ongoing Zionist Genocide.”

With the trial set to last 10 weeks, the prisoners on trial at Woolwich Crown Court, are having considerable daily suffering inflicted upon them, with several being brought from HMP Bronzefield, a 2 hour journey away. They are being woken each day at 5am, and transported in vehicles known as ‘sweat boxes’, by the notoriously incompetent and uncaring private prisons company, Serco. They are receiving little if any food, their court clothes, (and at least one of their evidence bundles), are being lost or misplaced, and it is difficult for them to shower, rest, make phone calls, or consult with their lawyers, particularly as they often arrive at court late.

Despite the disinterest of the British government in the health and welfare of the Prisoners For Palestine hunger-strikers, (Qesser, Amu, Heba, Jon, T, and Kamran), there has been a groundswell of support both in Britain and abroad, with protests and actions taking place, including seven solidarity protests outside British prisons last weekend, with hundreds attending, a banner drop on Westminster Bridge, and political prisoners abroad taking solidarity action.

Shahmina Alam, sister of hunger-striker Kamran Ahmed, and a pharmacist who fully understood the health implications of the protest, told the press conference, of her brother, who is experiencing breathing difficulties: “I dread the call I’m going to get today, I also dread the call I’m going to get telling me that he’s passed out, I dread the day I don’t receive a phone call at all.”

Another key demand of the hunger-strikers is the deproscription of Palestine Action. With the proscription set to be challenged by way of Judicial Review, between the 25^th and 27^th of November, Defend Our Juries have organised a fresh wave of ‘Lift The Ban’ protests, which started yesterday in 10 British towns and cities, and will continue at least until the 29^th November. The more than 150 people arrested for holding up signs opposing Genocide, and supporting Palestine Action, will join more than 2000 other activists previously arrested at ‘Lift The Ban’ demos, including Steve Masters, an RAF veteran of 19 years, who spoke at this morning’s press conference, saying: “I never imagined that I would have to protest the complicity of my own government in a genocide.”

Saeed Taji Farouky centred the hunger-strike very much in the Palestinian struggle, telling the press conference: “These are people who inherit a very proud legacy of Palestinian resistance in general, and also Palestinian resistance within prisons in particular, and I assure you that the Palestinian people themselves consider these prisoners an integral part of the fight against Zionism, an integral part of the liberation movement.”

While suffering physically due to the effects of the hunger-strike, the six prisoners currently taking part in the protest remain strong, defiant, and committed to winning their six demands:

1. An end to the censorship of letters and books, and freedom of expression.
2. Immediate bail.
3. The right to a fair trial.
4. The deproscription of Palestine Action.
5. The closure of all Elbit weapons factories in Britain.

Speaking for Prisoners for Palestine, former Palestine Action prisoner, Francesca Nadin, said: “Those on hunger-strike, and all the prisoners, stand shoulder to shoulder with those on trial currently. We are united in this fight, whether it be in the courts, in the prisons, or on the streets.” Of the hunger-strikers, she said, “They are taking power back into their own hands, for justice, for freedom, and most importantly for the liberation of Palestine.”

Francesca then read Bernadette McAliskey’s inspiring solidarity statement. Speaking of the terrible cost paid by the Irish hunger-strikers imprisoned by the British Crown, Bernadette reminded us that, “there is no barbarity, no abuse of the political system, no abuse of the law to cover their own breaches of International Law, to which a British government, still imbued by Colonial entitlement and privilege will not stoop.”

Bernadette’s message of solidarity continued: “Our hearts break for the ‘Filton’ and ‘Brize Norton’ prisoners, their families and friends, because we have been there. We know the price a morally bankrupt Government will exact from the young idealists who, to prevent international crime, and terrorist action, took direct preventative action against the weapons of war. This is not terrorism. This is resistance. This is direct action forced on decent human beings because the government, with whom the duty lies to resist terrorism, is implicit in it by omission and commission.”

Civil and human rights activists in Ireland, North and South, join with those across the UK in being righteously outraged by the actions of the Labour Government in criminalising legitimate protest against genocide and the government’s complicity in facilitating and financing it.   While many life-time supporters of the British Labour party find it almost beyond belief that UK citizens would find themselves imprisoned in Britain, and their fundamental rights as prisoners violated to the extent that they have determined to protest this injustice with the one thing left to them, their lives, we in Ireland, are not surprised.  We have been here, many times, under both Tory and Labour colonial governments, as has Palestine.  Following the daylight murder, in January 1972, of peaceful protesters marching against imprisonment without trial; the barbarian treatment of Irish prisoners Marian & Dolores Price, force-fed in a British prison by pouring jugs of ‘gruel’ directly into the stomach through a tube forced down the throat, to holding a pregnant woman, not even charged then or since, in solitary confinement in Belmarsh Male high security prison, right through to the hunger strikes of 1980 and 1981 in which ten prisoners, whose average age was 25 years old lost their lives, there is no barbarity, no abuse of the political system, no abuse of the law to cover their own breaches of International Law, to which a British government still imbued by Colonial entitlement and privilege would not stoop.

Our hearts break for the ‘Filton’ and ‘Brize Norton‘ prisoners, their families and friends, because we have been there.  We know the price a morally bankrupt Government will exact from the young idealists who, to prevent international crime, and terrorist action, took direct preventative action against the weapons of war.  This is not terrorism.  This is resistance.  This is direct action forced on decent human beings because the government, with whom the duty lies to resist terrorism, is complicit in it by omission and commission.

Keir Starmer is a barrister of note. He is not ignorant of the law. He is contemptuous of it as is the Home Secretary. The have abused their stewardship to fashion the law to serve the needs of their colonial project – the State of Israel – at any cost. The courage and integrity of the Filton 24 and Brize Norton 5 stands in stark contrast to that.  It is for exposing the moral bankruptcy of the government, for resisting the abuse of power in fashioning ‘anti-terrorist’ legislation, and rendering illegal, legitimate action for the ‘crime’ of being effective. Their purpose and intent is to terrorise people from speaking out and speaking up against the genocide of Palestinians and destruction of Palestine.  Their treatment of the Filton prisoners is to make an example of them and still they resist. The British government needs to learn from its past errors. This policy of repression and terror does not lead to people giving up, giving in, going home, and saying nothing. A safer, better, kinder, and more equal world will not come from militarisation war and recolonisation. The people are entitled to assume that the Government knows that, and as long as it remains committed to pursuing those policies, they must resist. 

I stand unequivocally with the Filton 24, with Palestine Action, and in this tormented hour with the hunger strikers and their families and friends. I call on every human being in the land with a conscience to do the same.  They have ‘terrorised’ nobody! Nobody is afraid of them. People are afraid for them and for others at the mercy of a Labour government that is daily abusing its power and responsibility to placate the USA and Israel and share the colonial spoils of war. I echo to Keir Starmer the question Pearse asked of the Government of his day:

‘Did you think to conquer the people, or that Law was stronger than life and the desire to be free? We will have it out with you! Tyrants, hypocrites, Liars’

Solidarity and Strength. Bernadette

At 12PM on Saturday 15th November, five protestors were arrested under the Terrorism Act for dropping a large banner from Westminster Bridge which read, ‘We Support The Hunger Strike. We Support Palestine Action.’

The action was taken not only in support of Palestine Action, who were proscribed as a ‘terrorist’ group, by the British government, on the 5th July 2025, but in support of the hunger-strike currently being undertaken by a number of Palestine Action prisoners. The prisoners, who have formed Prisoners For Palestine, launched an indefinite, rolling, national hunger-strike on the 2nd of November, the anniversary of the signing of the Balfour Declaration, in support of a list of demands communicated to the government 2 weeks earlier.

The first 2 prisoners to refuse food were Qesser Zuhrah and Amu Gibb in Bronzefield Prison, and over the next few days they were joined by Heba Muraisi in New Hall Prison, Jon Cink in Bronzefield Prison, T Hoxha in Peterborough Prison, and Kamran Ahmed in Pentonville. All the prisoners have been held on remand since being arrested by counter-terrorist police a year ago, though none are charged with terrorist offences. Qesser, Heba, T and Kamran are members of the Filton 24, accused of destroying killer drones at Elbit UK’s facility in Filton, Bristol. Amu and Jon have been imprisoned since June, accused of being involved in the Palestine Action raid on RAF Brize Norton, when cargo planes were sprayed with red paint. More prisoners are expected to join the hunger strike.

The prisoners demands are that the prisons stop censoring and restricting their mail, phone calls, and books, that they have a right to a fair trial, without the interference of the British and Israeli states, and Israeli arms companies like Elbit Systems. Elbit are Israel’s biggest arms manufacturer, supplying 85% of the predator drones used to kill Palestinians in Gaza, and the prisoners are demanding their British factories close for good. After a year, unconvicted, on remand, with up to another year to come, before trial, well-exceeding the statutory custody limit of 6 months, the prisoners are demanding immediate bail. With their harsh treatment having deteriorated even further since Palestine Action were proscribed, the prisoners are demanding deproscription.

There has been a huge outpouring of public support for Palestine Action since they were proscribed, with more than 2000 people already arrested, mainly for holding up signs reading, ‘I Oppose Genocide. I Support Palestine Action.’ It is anticipated that the protestors responsible for today’s banner drop, shaming the British Parliament to its face, will join the ever-swelling numbers of those arrested under the Terrorism Act. Defend Our Juries, who have been co-ordinating the protests, will next week launch another wave of civil disobedience, with protests planned in dozens of British towns and cities. The Lift The Ban actions are timed to coincide with the Palestine Action challenge to their proscription, by way of Judicial Review, which will take place between the 25th and 27th November.

This weekend there are also protests at seven British prisons: Pentonville, New Hall, Styal, Low Newton, Bronzefield, Peterborough, and Eastwood Park. The solidarity actions will take place on both Saturday and Sunday.

Despite Prisoners For Palestine communicating their demands to the Home Secretary 2 weeks before the protest began, as the hunger-strike enters its 3rd week, there has still been no response from Keir Starmer’s government.

The first of the three trials of the Filton 24 begins at Woolwich Crown Court on Monday, 17th November, and there will be solidarity demonstrations outside the court.

A spokesperson from Prisoners for Palestine said: 

“Today’s banner drop echoes the sentiment of people across this country, who are disgusted by the proscription of Palestine Action and the ongoing imprisonment of protestors who oppose genocide. There are six prisoners for Palestine who are engaging in an open ended hunger strike, left with no other option but to use their bodies as a tool to resist injustice.

Each of the prisoners face up to two years on remand without trial, far exceeding the six month pre-trial custody time limit. They’ve also faced harsher treatment due to the weaponising of counter-terrorism powers against them. Now, they’ve entered their 14th day of hunger strike and people across the country are mobilising in support of them.”

Images

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