Palestine Action


Palestine Action is a British pro-Palestinian direct action network. Founded in 2020 with the stated goal of ending global participation in Israel's "genocidal and apartheid regime", the organisation also became active in the Gaza war protests in the United Kingdom, in the wake of the ongoing Gaza genocide.
The group uses direct action to disrupt the UK arms industry, which it accuses of being complicit with Israel in conducting a genocide. Palestine Action have mounted 45 documented direct actions in the United Kingdom. Key targets have been British factories of Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems and RAF Brize Norton base. In their campaigns, Palestine Action have used protest, occupation of premises, destruction of property, and vandalism, which sometimes resulted in its members being arrested. A protest action on 6 August 2024 resulted in a charge of grievous bodily harm after an activist allegedly struck a police officer with a sledgehammer, and a protest on 16 March 2025 resulted in three activists being charged with one count each of assault by beating.
The British Government proscribed Palestine Action as a terrorist group on 5 July 2025 under the UK's Terrorism Act 2000 after members of the network vandalised Royal Air Force aircraft at Brize Norton. Between then and the end of November 2025, British police had arrested at least 2,489 individuals for showing support to Palestine Action, many of these resulting from sit-ins on Parliament Square on 9 August 2025 and 6 September 2025, and on Trafalgar Square on 4 October 2025. A further 24 silent vigils were planned for November 2025.
Civil liberties groups have criticised the ban as conflating protest with terrorism. Lawyers for Palestine Action have said the group can be compared to the suffragettes. Huda Ammori, co-founder of Palestine Action, said the "votes-for-women movement" would have faced the same ban, if today's terrorism laws had been in place more than 100 years ago.

History

Palestine Action was established on 30 July 2020 when activists broke into and spray-painted the interior of Elbit Systems' UK headquarters in London. The organisation's co-founders are Huda Ammori, daughter of a Palestinian father and an Iraqi mother, and Richard Barnard, a long-term left-wing activist.
Three injuries resulted from the August 2024 raid on Elbit at Aztec West, and in March 2025 three activists were charged with one count of assault by beating after a raid on another Elbit facility at Aztec West.
In June 2025, the Home Office announced that it intended to designate the group as a proscribed terrorist organisation after the group broke into RAF Brize Norton, vandalising and damaging two Royal Air Force Airbus A330 MRTT refuelling planes by spraying paint into their engines. On 2 July, the House of Commons voted 385–26 to proscribe Palestine Action alongside two other groups as terrorist organisations. The order was accepted by the House of Lords the following day and Palestine Action is proscribed from 5 July 2025. The High Court had a hearing on 21 July to consider an application for a judicial review to quash the proscription order; a hearing on 4 July declined to grant an interim relief order.
Since 5 July 2025, it has been an offence under the UK's Terrorism Act 2000 to be a member of Palestine Action, fundraise for it, wear or display items arousing reasonable suspicion of membership or support, or if someone invites support or "expresses an opinion or belief supportive of" Palestine Action and "in doing so is reckless as to whether a person to whom the expression is directed will be encouraged to support" it. These offences carry a maximum penalty of fines and up to 14 years in prison for membership or inviting support, and up to 6 months in prison for displaying supporting items. A legal action against the group's proscription has been ongoing since November 2025.

Actions

Elbit

On 19 May 2021, during the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis, four members of the group dressed in red boiler suits climbed onto the roof of an Elbit Systems-owned unmanned aerial vehicle factory in Meridian Business Park, Leicester. The occupation lasted six days, and a total of 10 arrests were made for conspiracy to commit criminal damage and aggravated trespass. The defendants were cleared after the trial judge instructed the jury to consider the common law defence of necessity and the statutory defence of protection of property under Section 5 of the Criminal Damage Act 1971. The same year the group staged similar occupations of Elbit Systems sites in Bristol, Oldham in collaboration with Extinction Rebellion, and Tamworth in collaboration with Animal Rebellion. Repeated occupations and damage at the Oldham site preceded its permanent closure and sale in January 2022. This series of actions contributed to multi-day shutdowns and potentially contributed to the loss of a £2.1bn contract between Elbit UK and the Ministry of Defence.
In April 2024, Somerset County Hall, a Grade II-listed public building owned by Somerset Council, was splashed with red paint after a Palestine Action protest. The protest was related to the council's leasing of a building in the Aztec West business park to defence contractor Elbit Systems UK.
On 6 August 2024, two police officers and an Elbit employee were injured during a break-in at Elbit's Aztec West premises. Reports and video indicated that one police officer was struck on the spine with a sledgehammer and was unable to work for three months due to the severity of the injury. Six activists were arrested.
On 16 March 2025, Elbit's Aztec West site was targeted by four Palestine Action activists with, according to BBC News, a "cherry picker style vehicle and a hammer attached to a rope to smash second floor windows and douse red paint". The four were arrested on the site, all being charged with conspiracy to damage property and three being charged with one count of assault by beating.
In September 2025, the Aztec West site was reported by The Guardian to have closed unexpectedly, with the site found deserted aside from security staff despite a lease running until 2029.

Elbit subsidiaries

In April 2022, two Palestine Action protestors chained themselves to the gates of a factory of UAV Tactical Systems Ltd, a subsidiary of Elbit Systems, in Braunstone. Other activists gathered nearby with signs stating "Free Palestine". Three protestors were arrested. A spokesperson for the group said that "Direct action will not cease until all Elbit sites are closed". These and other actions contributed to multi-day shutdowns and potentially contributed to the loss of a £2.1bn contract between Elbit UK and the Ministry of Defence.
Hydrafeed, a supplier of 'automation equipment' for CNC turning and milling applications, was attacked by Palestine Action activists in June 2023 accusing Hydrafeed of supplying Instro Precision Ltd, an Elbit Systems subsidiary. Hydrafeed denied the accusation and maintained they were falsely targeted, claiming "Hydrafeed would like to inform all of our customers and suppliers that we have absolutely no connection with the aforementioned company. We do not supply and never have supplied Elbit Systems with any of our products...This act of vandalism on Hydrafeed's property and machines was completely unfounded." Later in the year Hydrafeed allegedly broke off all ties with Elbit Systems, reportedly sending an email to Palestine Action reading; "Hydrafeed has made it clear to Instro Precision that it is not prepared to provide any sales or services of its products to Instro Precision, its parent company Elbit Systems or any of Elbit Systems subsidiaries now or in the future." Multiple shutdowns and damage at the site resulted in an estimated £1 million+ in losses and temporary immobilisation of the facility.

Leonardo

In November 2023, Palestine Action activists spray painted messages "Free Gaza" and "Free Palestine" across weapons company Leonardo S.p.A.'s UK head office in Piccadilly, with the protestors stating that Leonardo had supplied Israel with fighter jets. Two men were arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated criminal damage, which was investigated as a hate crime.
In May 2024, Edinburgh Palestine Action activists targeted a Leonardo factory in Crewe Toll, spraying red paint over the factory and fighter-jet models, as well as claiming to have sabotaged "internet cables", with a spokesperson for the group saying, "In the early hours of Tuesday 28th May , a group opened the box of cables, cut the internet wires, sprayed expanding foam inside the box and spray painted 'Stop Arming Israel' on the lid." The action was carried out, against Leonardo, according to PA Scotland, for "continuing to arm the Israeli military with weapons". In January of the same year several activists occupied the roof of the same factory.

University protests

In March 2024, Palestine Action claimed responsibility for spray painting a historic portrait of politician Arthur Balfour at Trinity College, Cambridge. Palestine Action said the action was taken because of the 1917 Balfour Declaration. Three months later, in June 2024, Cambridge students, in collaboration with Palestine Action, sprayed the historic Senate House red in the University of Cambridge. In March 2025, members of Palestine Action threw red paint on the "Old Schools" building in the University of Cambridge, citing further pressure for the university to divest from companies selling arms to the Israeli military.
In November 2024, Palestine Action members broke a glass cabinet in the University of Manchester's Chemistry Building on the Oxford Road campus, and stole two busts of Chaim Weizmann, the first president of Israel and a former teacher at the university. Palestine Action said it had "abducted" the busts to mark the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration in 1917. one individual has been arrested for the action.