On Tuesday 20 August at Glasgow Sheriff Court, five young people from Palestine Action Scotland were jailed.
Israel, the climate crisis, and the UK’s political prisoners
It was after they occupied Thales’s weapons factory in Govan, Glasgow, on 1 June 2022. The five occupied the roof of the arms maker and dropped banners to disrupt production. Two of them also damaged weaponry inside the building. In total, they cost Thales’ over £1m in losses.
Three who were convicted of ‘Breach of the peace’ were given 12 month custodial sentences. Whereas two of the five who were convicted of ‘breach of the peace’ and ‘malicious mischief’ were given 14 months and 16 months custodial sentences. They will be expected to serve half of their sentences in prison.
The Judge stated the aim of the harsh sentences was to deter further activism against weapons companies in Scotland.
There has now been more than 40 political prisoners jailed in Britain since July for taking action to stop crimes against humanity.
16 of these are linked to the group Palestine Action, which takes direct action to stop Britain facilitating violations of international humanitarian law by Israel against the civilian population of Gaza.
26 are linked to Just Stop Oil, which takes direct action in support of science-based demands to prevent catastrophic and irreversible harm to humanity and life on earth.
Enabling Israel’s genocide
Thales is one of the world’s largest arms companies – producing armoured vehicles, missile systems and military UAVs (drones). Thales works in partnership with Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons company, to produce military drones in their joint owned factory in Leicester called UAV Tactical Systems. They both work on the ‘Watchkeeper’ drone project which was modelled on Elbit’s Hermes 450 and “battle-tested” on the Palestinian people.
A Palestine Action spokesperson said:
Imprisoning activists for taking action against Scotland’s arms trade with Israel only serves to protect companies enabling genocide. Such sentences will urge more people to acknowledge Scottish complicity with the ongoing Gaza genocide and motivate them to take action against it. It is those who arm the massacres of the Palestinian people who are guilty, not those who take action to stop them.
On Friday, the senior British diplomat, Mark Smith, resigned from the FCDO over arms sales to Israel:
It is with sadness that I resign after a long career in the diplomatic service, however, I can no longer carry out my duties in the knowledge that this Department may be complicit in war crimes.
Defend Palestine Action
A spokesperson for Defend Our Juries said:
It was just over 10 years ago in September 2013, that Russia jailed 30 Greenpeace activists for a daring direct action against the Prirazlomnaya oil drilling platform. The action was widely perceived as symptomatic of Russia’s descent into authoritarianism under Putin. After concerted diplomatic pressure, the 30 were released in December 2013 after 3 months imprisonment.
But now Britain has decided to follow in Putin’s footsteps by filling its own broken prison system with political prisoners – people of conscience who have taken direct action to stop crimes against humanity.
Meanwhile, last year it was revealed by the Guardian that the Israeli government had sought a political intervention in criminal trials concerning Palestine Action:
Israeli embassy officials in London attempted to get the attorney general’s office to intervene in UK court cases relating to the prosecution of protesters, documents seen by the Guardian suggest.
Featured image via Palestine Action/Guy Smallman
