Palestine Action has won a legal challenge against the Home Office’s decision to ban it as a terror group, with the judge citing the European Convention on Human Rights and saying the group has not yet engaged in enough terrorism to warrant a ban. The Telegraph has more.
The ban, which began on July 5th last year, made being a member of the group or supporting it a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
The group has taken responsibility for numerous incidents of vandalism, trespass and theft, often targeting firms it claims have links to Israel.
However, after a seven-month court battle launched by the group’s co-founder, the High Court has now ruled the ban was “disproportionate”.
The decision means that more than 2,000 people who were arrested for holding signs or displaying messages in support of the group may now have proceedings dropped.
Dame Victoria Sharp said: “The court considered that the proscription of Palestine Action was disproportionate.
“The nature and scale of Palestine Action’s activities falling within the definition of terrorism had not yet reached the level, scale and persistence to warrant proscription.”
Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, said she was “disappointed” with the decision, which the Government will appeal against.
She said: “The court has acknowledged that Palestine Action has carried out acts of terrorism, celebrated those who have taken part in those acts and promoted the use of violence.
“It has also concluded that Palestine Action is not an ordinary protest or civil disobedience group, and that its actions are not consistent with democratic values and the rule of law.”
Palestine Action remains banned as a terror group to allow for further legal arguments and to give the Government time to consider its appeal. …
The High Court ruled that the proscription of Palestine Action involved “very significant interference” with protesters’ rights under the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). …
In its judgment, the court concluded: “Considering in the round the evidence available to the Home Secretary when the decision to proscribe was made, the nature and scale of Palestine Action’s activities, so far as they comprise acts of terrorism, has not yet reached the level, scale and persistence that would justify the application of the criminal law measures that are the consequence of proscription, and the very significant interference with Convention rights consequent on those measures.” …
The Palestine Action ruling could significantly reduce the Home Secretary’s ability to proscribe terrorist groups, the Home Office will argue in its legal challenge to Friday’s ruling.
Lawyers for Shabana Mahmood will point to the judges’ own verdict on Palestine Action to justify the Government’s ban on the group.
The Home Office noted, for example, that the court had found Palestine Action “has organised and undertaken actions amounting to terrorism”. The group had also not suggested these actions were a mistake or aberration but had “lauded” those who took part.
The Home Office also pointed to the finding by the judges that the picture Palestine Action sought to paint of “an ordinary protest group engaged in activities that fall within the well-established tradition of peaceful protest” was “not accurate”.
It noted that the court also dismissed suggestions that the attacks by the group on lawful businesses were “civil disobedience” and rulings that Palestine Action was not a non-violent organisation and promoted the use of violence.
What an utterly ludicrous decision – not enough terrorism yet! – and a flagrant violation of Parliamentary sovereignty. Who’s in charge here, the elected Government and legislature, or unelected Left-wing judges?
Follow the Telegraph‘s live coverage here.
See Related Article Below
High Court Rules UK Terrorism Ban on Palestine Action Unlawful
JOHN MCEVOY, DANIA AKKAD, MARTIN WILLIAMS
The Home Office’s decision to ban Palestine Action as a terrorist group last year was unlawful, a three-judge panel at the High Court has ruled.
In a hearing on Friday, Dame Victoria Sharp, one of the judges, said there had been “very significant interference with the right to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.”
The court, she said, considered the proscription of the group “disproportionate.”
Despite the ruling, the group will remain proscribed until a further court order because it has “yet to hear argument on whether there should be a stay of any order setting aside the proscription order pending the possibility of appeal,” the judges said.
The judgment is a major blow for former Home Secretary Yvette Cooper as well as the Israeli arms companies who lobbied for a crackdown on the group.
It will be a relief for over 2,700 protesters who have been arrested for showing support for the group since the controversial ban.
The ruling comes a week after a jury decided not to convict six Palestine Action members accused of some of the most serious criminal charges leveled against the group.
Huda Ammori, the co-founder of Palestine Action who challenged the proscription order, said on Friday:
“This is a monumental victory both for our fundamental freedoms here in Britain and in the struggle for freedom for the Palestinian people, striking down a decision that will forever be remembered as one of the most extreme attacks on free speech in recent British history.”
Ammori won on two of the four grounds that she brought in her challenge. The court found that the proscription decision violated rights enshrined in U.K. law, namely freedoms of expression, peaceful assembly and association with others.
It also upheld her claims that Cooper’s decision to proscribe the group was not consistent with the Home Office’s own policy.
British Home Secretary Shabana Mahmo0d in September 2025. (James Whatling / Parsons Media for the Home Office/Flicker/CC BY 4.0)
The government will appeal the decision. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said the court had acknowledged that Palestine Action had carried out acts of terrorism and that it was “not an ordinary protest or civil disobedience group”.
“For those reasons, I am disappointed by the court’s decision and disagree with the notion that banning this terrorist organisation is disproportionate,” Mahmood said.
The decision to authorise a judicial review had been made in part to expedite the unprecedented number of terrorism-related cases moving through the courts.
‘A Lot of Uncertainty’
Around 40 protesters stood outside the court on Friday ahead of the ruling, holding Palestine Action placards, poised for arrest with several Metropolitan Police vans parked nearby.
But police officers at the scene told Declassified that they hadn’t been given orders to make arrests.
In a subsequent statement, the force clarified that it is now focused on gathering evidence of those showing support for the group for potential future enforcement, rather than making arrests.
Roars and celebration erupted outside the court soon after the ruling was read out, but questions remain about exactly what will happen next.
One protester holding a placard told Declassified: “I’m relieved but there is still a lot of uncertainty in my mind about where this is headed.”
The court has directed parties to provide written submissions by 20 February on next steps in light of the judgement.
‘Honourable History’
Sign at a pro-Palestine demonstration in the U.K., June 2025. (Palestine Action)
The ban on Palestine Action was announced in June 2025 shortly after activists broke into RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire and sprayed red paint into the turbines of two military aircraft used for refuelling and transport.
Cooper told Parliament that month: “The U.K.’s defence enterprise is vital to the nation’s national security and this Government will not tolerate those who put that security at risk”.
An order was pushed through Parliament in July which added Palestine Action to the list of banned groups under the Terrorism Act 2000.
The Home Office included two Russian neo-Nazi organisations, the Maniac Murder Cult and Russian Imperial Movement, within the same order.
It marked the first time in British history that the government used terrorism legislation to ban a civil disobedience organisation. Only 26 out of 650 MPs voted against the ban.
Raza Husain KC, representing Ammori, told the High Court in November that “civil disobedience on conscientious grounds has a long and honourable history in this country,” arguing that Palestine Action followed in the footsteps of direct action protest groups stretching back centuries.
“It is the mark of a civilised society that protests of this type can be accommodated,” Husain added. “Our client Ms. Ammori has been inspired by a long tradition of direct action in this country from the suffragettes to anti-apartheid activists to Iraq war protesters.”
Iran
The Home Office sought to justify the ban on Palestine Action by briefing the press that the group might be funded by Iran.
On June 23, the day of Cooper’s statement to parliament, the Times published a report saying “Iran could be funding Palestine Action, Home Office officials claimed.”
It added: “Officials are understood to be investigating its source of donations amid concerns that the Iranian regime, via proxies, is funding the group’s activities given that their objectives are aligned.”
Shortly afterwards, the Daily Mail asked: “Does Palestine Action’s cash trail lead all the way to Iran?” with GB News, the Spectator, and the Telegraph also picking up on the story.
This point was contested by the U.K.’s independent expert on terrorism, Jonathan Hall KC, who told Channel 4 News earlier this week that those press briefings were “wrong.”
Hall was “not aware” of any evidence behind those claims, he added.
British intelligence reports first exposed by Declassified in July indicated that the ban was in fact largely driven by Palestine Action’s impact on the Israeli arms industry in Britain.
John McEvoy is chief reporter for Declassified UK. John is an historian and filmmaker whose work focuses on British foreign policy and Latin America. His PhD was on Britain’s Secret Wars in Colombia between 1948 and 2009, and he is currently working on a documentary about Britain’s role in the rise of Augusto Pinochet.
Dania Akkad is an investigative journalist. She has won awards for her reporting on women’s rights in the Middle East, Saudi Arabian dissidents and California’s lettuce industry. She started her career covering crime and agribusiness at daily newspapers in California, and then reported from Syria as a freelance journalist before the war, including investigating the 2005 suicide bombing in Amman that killed members of her family. She served most recently as senior investigations editor at Middle East Eye.
Martin Williams is Declassified UK’s chief investigator. He previously worked for The Guardian, Channel 4 News and openDemocracy, where he was U.K. investigations editor. His book, Parliament Ltd, exposed widespread corruption in British politics and sparked multiple inquiries by Westminster authorities. Martin has published investigations on issues ranging from lobbying and dark money, to espionage and human rights.
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