Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel arrive for a news conference at the Department of Justice on December 4, 2025, in Washington, DC. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
A former official from Trump’s first term said the FBI will be able to throw the full might of the surveillance state at “Americans whose primary ‘offense’ may be ideological dissent.”
The Trump administration is about to embark on a massive crackdown on what it describes as a scourge of rampant left-wing “terrorism.”
But the US Department of Justice (DOJ) memo ordering the crackdown has critics fearing it will go far beyond punishing those who plan criminal acts and will instead be used to criminalize anyone who expresses opposition to President Donald Trump and his agenda.
Earlier this month, independent journalist Ken Klippenstein reported that Attorney General Pam Bondi had sent out a memo ordering the FBI to “compile a list of groups or entities engaging in acts that may constitute domestic terrorism.”
As part of this effort, Bondi set Thursday as a deadline for all law enforcement agencies to “coordinate delivery” of intelligence files related to “antifa” or “antifa-related activities” to the FBI.
The memo identifies those who express “opposition to law and immigration enforcement; extreme views in favor of mass migration and open borders; adherence to radical gender ideology,” as well as “anti-Americanism,” “anti-capitalism,” and “anti-Christianity,” as potential targets for investigation.
This language references National Security Presidential Memorandum-7, or NSPM-7, a memo issued by Trump in September, which identified this slate of left-wing beliefs as potential “indicators” of terrorism following the assassination of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk in September.
In comments made before the alleged shooter’s identity was revealed, Trump attributed the murder to “those on the radical left [who] have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis,” adding that “this kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country and must stop right now.”
Weeks after Kirk’s shooting, Trump designated “antifa” as a “domestic terrorism organization,” a move that alarmed critics because “antifa,” short for “anti-fascist,” is a loosely defined ideology rather than an organized political group.
Senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller, meanwhile, promised that the Trump administration would use law enforcement to “dismantle” left-wing groups he said were “fomenting violence.” He suggested that merely using heated rhetoric—including calling Trump and his supporters “fascist” or “authoritarian”—“incites violence and terrorism.”
Klippenstein said that “where NSPM-7 was a declaration of war on just about anyone who isn’t MAGA,” the memo that went into effect Thursday “is the war plan for how the government will wage it on a tactical level.”
In comments to the Washington Post, former FBI agent Michael Feinberg, who is now a senior editor at Lawfare, said it was “a pretty damn dangerous document,” in part because “it is directed at a specific ideology, namely the left, without offering much evidence as to why that is necessary.”
Studies have repeatedly shown that while all political factions contain violent actors, those who commit acts of political violence are vastly more likely to identify with right-wing causes.
Miles Taylor, who served as chief of staff for the Department of Homeland Security under the first Trump administration, pointed out in a blog post the extraordinary surveillance capability that the FBI will have at its disposal to use against those it targets.
He said it “includes the FBI’s ability to marshal facial recognition, phone-tracking databases, license-plate readers, financial records review, undercover operations, and intelligence-sharing tools against Americans whose primary ‘offense’ may be ideological dissent.”
“Unfortunately, once you are fed into that system, there is no real ‘due process’ until charges are brought,” Taylor said. “It’s not like you get a text-message notification when the FBI begins investigating you for terrorism offenses, and there’s certainly no ‘opt-out’ feature. For this to happen, you don’t need to commit violence. You don’t even need to plan it. Under the administration’s new guidelines, you merely need to be flagged for association with the anti-fascist movement to become a potential target.”
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Wash.), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told the Post, “It is a throwback to McCarthyism and the worst abuses of [Former FBI Director J. Edgar] Hoover’s FBI to use federal law enforcement against Americans purely because of their political beliefs or because they disagree with the current president’s politics.”
Taylor argued: “He’s right, but it’s actually more dangerous than that. Joseph McCarthy had subpoenas and hearings and created his blacklists of ‘communist’ Americans from Capitol Hill. And while controversial FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover may have had old-school wiretaps and informants, Donald Trump’s team has algorithmic surveillance, bulk data collection, and a post-9/11 security state designed for permanent emergency. It’s like comparing a snowflake with a refrigerator.”
Keir Starmer warns against following the https://onaquietday.org blog.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.
Indigenous demonstrators shout slogans during a demonstration at Parque Central Cayambe, Ecuador, as part of the national strike on October 1, 2025 | Felipe Stanley/Agencia Press South/Getty Images
Taking from Trump’s playbook and reviving colonial trope, President Noboa labelled Indigenous protesters ‘terrorists’
Recent years have seen Western governments extoll their democratic values while leading increasingly harsh crackdowns on dissent, with activists arrested and accused of terrorism.
Now, Ecuador has gone even further. President Daniel Noboa’s far-right government met recent nationwide anti-austerity protests with a brutality that has left two protesters dead, 473 injured, 12 missing, and 206 detained, according to the Alliance of Human Rights Organisations of Ecuador.
A 31-day national strike erupted on 22 September, nine days after Noboa removed fuel subsidies, raising the price of diesel by 55% from $1.80 to $2.80 per gallon. The demonstrations, which disrupted the movement of goods and people across the country as protesters blocked main roads, were led by Ecuador’s largest Indigenous organisation, the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities, which represents many of the people who will be the hardest hit by the price hikes.
The government responded by imposing a state of emergency and deploying troops to break up protesters, leading to state-inflicted violence that drew criticism from civil rights groups in Ecuador and across the world.
Human Rights Watch reported it had “verified 15 videos” of “soldiers or police officers forcibly dispersing peaceful demonstrations and using tear gas and other ‘less lethal’ weapons recklessly and indiscriminately”, while Amnesty International warned of “excessive use of force against protesters by the security forces, possible arbitrary arrests, as well as the opening of abusive criminal proceedings and freezing of bank accounts belonging to social leaders and protesters”.
The unrest came as Ecuadorian voters prepare to vote on a series of referendums on 16 November. Perhaps the most controversial question they will answer is over whether to accept foreign military bases on Ecuador’s territory.
The ballot does not explicitly refer to the United States, but it may as well do; this week, US homeland security secretary Kristi Noem made her second visit to the Latin American country in four months to scout out locations for new US military bases.
Noboa’s government has long pushed for greater alignment with the US. While Ecuadorian opposition leaders warn that US military bases would threaten Ecuador’s sovereignty, both Noboa and Donald Trump’s administrations argue that they would help to stop transnational crime gangs from using the country to smuggle drugs from South America into the US.
Although polls suggest a slight majority of voters are against the bases, many are still undecided. Regardless of how they vote, Trump’s influence over Noboa’s government is already clear from the reaction to the recent Indigenous-led demonstrations. Taking from the US president’s playbook, ministers accused protesters of carrying out “terrorist acts” – directly echoing language used against activists in the US – and at least 13 people have been charged with terrorism after allegedly attacking the offices of police in Otavalo, a city in northern Ecuador.
This decision to cry terrorism is part of a strategy to turn social discontent into a security threat. Rather than answering the demands of protesters – the majority of whom were the poor people, transport workers and Indigenous peoples who will be hardest hit by fuel price increases – the government has chosen to criminalise dissent and militarise social conflict to protect its austerity measures from popular resistance.
But protest is not terrorism. It is the democratic voice of those who suffer most from inequality.
Unequal sacrifices
In Ecuador, an oil-producing country, the dispute over fuel subsidies is a recurring issue.
The subsidies have kept prices for petrol and diesel artificially low since the 1970s, but consecutive governments have argued they put too much strain on the national budget, costing the state billions, while international financial institutions have criticised them for “distorting” the economy. In 2022, the subsidies were equivalent to around 2% of Ecuador’s GDP, according to a report by the Ministry of Economy and Finance.
But for farmers, truck drivers and informal workers, the subsidies provide indispensable respite from low incomes and rising living costs. Therein lies the clash: what governments see as an easy way to make savings on their balance sheet will mean hunger for many ordinary people.
One key measure of the cost of living in Ecuador is the monthly price of the ‘basic family basket’, a government-defined set of goods needed to sustain a family of four, including food, clothing, medicine, household items and transport costs. In May this year, the price of that basic family basket reached $812, while the monthly minimum wage remained at $470. This disparity will only worsen with the removal of the diesel subsidy, which will make transport, food and the production of goods more expensive.
Previous attempts to scrap the fuel subsidies have caused the social unrest that has marked Ecuadorian politics in recent years. Two previous governments tried to do so in 2019 and 2022. Both instances sparked huge demonstrations that forced ministers into U-turns.
This time, Noboa’s government, which was elected in 2023, does not appear to be backing down. The Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities eventually called off their strike on 23 October in the wake of the state’s brutal repression, having been unable to secure any concessions.
If the government does succeed in removing the subsidies, it will lead to rising costs that will not be borne equally across Ecuador, a plurinational and multi-ethnic country where wealth is concentrated in certain areas and among certain racial groups.
The most recent data finds that 72% of the population self-identifies as mestizo, a term that refers to a person of mixed European and Indigenous American ancestry. The next largest demographic group is the Montubio people (7.4%), a rural ethnic group from coastal Ecuador; followed by Afro-Ecuadorians (7.2%), who also primarily live in the coastal provinces; then Indigenous people (7%) who largely live in the highlands and Amazon; and white people (6.1%), who have historically been based in larger cities.
The Afro-Ecuadorians and Indigenous populations in the country’s Amazon and rural coastal provinces will suffer most from the increases in transport and labour costs. Many of the families who will be affected are already impoverished, with a 40% poverty rate in these areas, far above the national rate of 28%.
Ecuador’s coast is dominated by export-oriented agribusiness and ports; the Andean highlands by public administration, services and manufacturing; while the oil extraction in the Amazonian east accounts for a large part of the country’s national income, without translating into local well-being.
The paradox is evident: the territories that produce wealth also face the greatest inequalities and deficits in health, education and basic services.
Women will also be hit harder by the removal of the fuel subsidies than men. The country’s 3.6% unemployment rate masks key gender inequalities; among women the rate is 4.6%, compared to 2.8% among men. Similarly, only 27% of women have access to adequate employment, with sufficient income and stability, compared to 41% of men, according to official figures.
The greater job insecurity created by rising food and household goods prices will disproportionately affect women. They will be forced to work longer hours to survive, particularly where they are responsible for the care of children or elderly relatives – another burden that disproportionately falls on women.
There is no neutrality in austerity: there is a regressive redistribution that privileges fiscal balance at the expense of the country’s most impoverished.
‘Terrorism’ and state coercion
While protests started in the immediate aftermath of the announcement on 13 September that the subsidies would be scrapped, the coordinated national strike began on 22 September.
Over the following 31 days, news broadcasts were full of images of this resistance across Ecuador: closed roads in Cuenca, pots and pans banging in Quito, women and children fleeing tear gas in San Rafael de la Laguna.
President Noboa imposed a state of emergency in many provinces, a measure that suspends constitutional guarantees such as the freedom of assembly, the inviolability of the home and correspondence, and the freedom of movement due to curfews. Last year, the Constitutional Court issued a warning to the president over the repeated use of this tool, which it said should be applied only in “extraordinary” circumstances.
By also condemning the protesters as “terrorists”, the government aims to delegitimise collective action, depoliticise the dispute over income and enable repression. Labelling Indigenous people as ‘offenders’ revives an old colonial trope of ‘internal enemies’, where racialised bodies are seen as a threat to order.
Noboa’s discourse is also part of a well-known Latin American genealogy: during the years of counterinsurgency, the labels of ‘subversion’ and ‘terrorism’ justified massacres, states of siege and arbitrary detentions. Today, that same language is being revived to shield a neoliberal model that is based not on consensus but on coercion.
For now, the question is not whether Ecuador can sustain fuel subsidies in the long term, but who gets to decide this. Removing subsidies without dialogue or progressive compensation mechanisms is governing against the majority.
A truly democratic policy would require real dialogue with Indigenous, Afro-Ecuadorian and peasant organisations, and including their voices in defining policies on the prices of utilities, including fuel, water and energy.
Wage and labour reform is also needed to link the minimum wage to the cost of the basic basket of goods and reduce gender and ethnic gaps, as well as territorial investment in the Amazon and rural areas to provide health, education and basic services. Finally, the demilitarisation of social conflict and the repeal of laws that criminalise protest.
The Noboa government seems to be choosing another path: shielding austerity with repression. But labelling those who defend life and bread for their families as terrorists does not resolve the conflict: it deepens it.
Protest is the language of those who refuse to be expelled from history by a model that promises order in exchange for inequality and silence.
*Rose Barboza is a Brazilian researcher and doctoral candidate in Social Sciences at the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Portugal. She specialises in transitional justice, feminist epistemologies and critical race theory. Her current work explores comparative cases of state repression and social movements across Latin America.
“We stick together – Antifa on the offensive!” reads a banner at a demonstration on June 14, 2025, in Jena, Thuringia, Germany, called by a broad alliance of anti-fascist groups under the slogan “Now more than ever! Anti-fascism is necessary!”. (Photo by Daniel Vogl/Picture Alliance via Getty Images)
Investigative journalist Ken Klippenstein warns that the designation opens up US citizens to government surveillance, asset seizure, and material support charges.
President Donald Trump’s State Department on Thursday broadened his efforts to use “terrorism” to crush his enemies on the left, designating four European groups as “foreign terrorist organizations” based on their alleged connections to the vaguely defined network of leftist agitators known as “antifa,” short for “anti-fascist.”
Following the assassination of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk in September, Trump turned his attention toward waging a war on left-wing protest groups and liberal nonprofits, describing them as part of a vast, interconnected web that was fomenting “terrorism,” primarily through First Amendment-protected speech.
As part of that effort, Trump formally designated “antifa” as a “domestic terrorist organization,” even though it is not a formal group with any structure, but rather, a loose confederation of individuals all expressing an amorphous political belief. Civil rights advocates warned that the vague nature of the designation could be extended to bring terrorism charges against anyone who describes the Trump administration’s actions as fascist or authoritarian.
Shortly after, Trump also signed a little-reported national security order, known as National Security Presidential Memorandum 7 (NSPM-7), which mandated a “national strategy to investigate and disrupt networks, entities, and organizations that foment political violence so that law enforcement can intervene in criminal conspiracies before they result in violent political acts.”
Some of the indicators of potential violence, the memo said, were “anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity,” “extremism on migration, race, and gender,” and “hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.”
Referencing NSPM-7 explicitly, the State Department on Thursday spread that crusade against the left overseas, slapping four German, Greek, and Italian anarchist groups with the label of “foreign terrorist organization” (FTO). The same designation has been given to groups like al-Qaeda, ISIS, and al-Shabaab.
Trump slaps Antifa with its first-ever foreign terror label, in move that explicitly cites NSPM-7. https://t.co/NIeWFNv1PZ
— Ken Klippenstein (NSPM-7 Compliant) (@kenklippenstein) November 13, 2025
The groups targeted were Antifa Ost in Germany; the Informal Anarchist Federation/International Revolutionary Front (FAI/FRI) in Italy; Armed Proletarian Justice in Greece; and Revolutionary Class Self-Defense, also in Greece.
The designation of Antifa Ost and other violent Antifa groups supports President Trump’s National Security Presidential Memorandum-7, an initiative to disrupt self-described ‘anti-fascism’ networks, entities, and organizations that use political violence and terroristic acts to undermine democratic institutions, constitutional rights, and fundamental liberties.
Groups affiliated with this movement ascribe to revolutionary anarchist or Marxist ideologies, including anti-Americanism, ‘anti-capitalism,’ and anti-Christianity, using these to incite and justify violent assaults domestically and overseas.
Each of the accused groups has had members charged with or convicted of violence, often against Neo-Nazis or adjacent far-right causes. But while they are more organized than America’s anti-fascist movement, they are still broad-based and diffuse.
Mirroring what studies have shown in the US, the far-right is responsible for the overwhelming bulk of political violence in the European Union. A 2024 study by Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) found that across Europe, the far-right was responsible for 85% of the violent targeted incidents they tracked.
Though Greece was one exception, where far-left violence was more prevalent than far-right violence, Mary Bossis, an emeritus professor of international security at Piraeus University in Athens, told The Guardianthat Greece’s anti-fascist movement has little to do with it.
“It is highly exaggerated to say that the antifa movement in Greece employs terror tactics,” she said. “They even run in elections and have never shown any sign of violence.”
While most social movements have some violent adherents, Bossis said, “that does not mean, as in the case of antifa, that the whole movement is either violent or supportive of terrorism. In fact, it is very much not the case… Standing against fascism does not make someone a terrorist.”
As Mark Bray, a Rutgers University professor who teaches a course on the history of antifascism, pointed out in The Guardian, Antifa Ost is the only one of the four groups designated by Trump that self-identifies as anti-fascist.
“The others are revolutionary groups,” he said. “This shows how the Trump administration is trying to lump all revolutionary and radical groups together under the label ‘antifa’. By establishing the (alleged) existence of foreign antifa groups, the Trump administration seems to be setting the stage for declaring American antifa groups (and all that they deem to be ‘antifa’) to be affiliated with these supposed foreign terrorist groups.”
Ken Klippenstein, an independent investigative journalist who has warned about NSPM-7 since its release, noted that this marks the first time that an entity in any of these three European countries has ever been slapped with the label of an FTO.
“The move seems an attempt to make people accustomed to white Westerners being treated as terrorists,” he wrote Thursday. “That, after all, is the goal of Trump’s national security directive NSPM-7.”
While there is no law on the books to back Trump’s designation of antifa as a domestic terrorist organization, there is such a designation for foreign terrorist groups.
Being designated as a member of a foreign terrorist organization can subject one to significant sanctions, including having assets in American banks frozen, being unable to enter the country, or being prosecuted for “material support.”
The government has used accusations of terrorism to go much farther, including carrying out extrajudicial assassinations of targets. Over the past two months, the Trump administration has bombed over a dozen boats in the Caribbean using the unsubstantiated justification that their passengers are “narco-terrorists” shipping drugs for cartels, which the administration has also designated as FTOs. The attacks have killed at least 76 people.
Attorney General Pam Bondi suggested last month that the Trump administration planned to use the “same approach” to antifa as it has with cartels, leading many to fear that might include assassinations.
Mehdi Hasan, the founder of the media outlet Zeteo, said the designation of these groups as terrorist organizations was “super bad for US citizens, especially on the left of the spectrum,” because it “gives this authoritarian administration potentially the power to surveil and go after US citizens on spurious ‘funding of FTO’ grounds.”
The State Department noted in a fact sheet on the designations that it is also seeking to target those in the US accused of supporting these groups.
“US persons are generally prohibited from conducting business with sanctioned persons. It is also a crime to knowingly provide material support or resources to those designated, or to attempt or conspire to do so,” the memo said. “Persons that engage in certain transactions or activities with those designated today may expose themselves to sanctions risk. Notably, engaging in certain transactions with them entails risk of secondary sanctions pursuant to counterterrorism authorities.”
Klippenstein said that while Trump’s “domestic terrorist” designation was limited, “with an FTO designation, the gloves come off,” opening Americans up to “FISA surveillance, seizure of financial assets, [and] material support charges.”
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Donald Trump warns against following the Onaquietday.org blog, says that he’s heard that she’s a witch with a black cat and a dangerous kitchen.Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
Defend Our Juries announce the locations of the 20 UK-wide local actions in their Lift The Ban campaign against the ban on Palestine Action and against the UK government’s complicity in genocide.
The actions are intended to restore fundamental rights in relation to protest and freedom of expression in the UK ahead of and during the judicial review of the proscription of Palestine Action (25–27 November).
Local police forces are operationally independent of central government so have to make their own choices about how to react to Lift The Ban protests. Police forces have chosen not to arrest sign-holders at previous actions in Derry, Edinburgh, Totnes, Norwich and Kendal – choosing instead to respect their right to protest and to freedom of expression.
Ordinary members of the public will be taking part in acts of dangerous sign-holding at 1pm in the following locations on Tuesday 18 November:
Edinburgh, Queen Elizabeth House, 1 Sibbald Walk, EH8 8FT
Caerdydd (Cardiff), Senedd
Oxford, Clarendon Building, OX1 3AZ
Newcastle, Civic Centre
Leeds, Dortmund Square
Aberystwyth, location to be announced
Nottingham, Green Heart (paved area near the new central library)
Northampton, The steps of Guildhall, St Giles’ Square, Northampton, NN1 1DE
Gloucester, Cathedral
Truro, Meet in the square outside front entrance of Truro Cathedral, High Cross
Then again on Saturday 22 in Belfast at The Square between the courts on Chichester Street.
And on Saturday 29 November in these locations:
Edinburgh, Queen Elizabeth House
Caerdydd (Cardiff), location to be announced nearer the date
Manchester, location to be announced
Birmingham, Chamberlain Square, B3 3DH (opposite Museum and Art Gallery)
Cambridge, Guildhall, opposite the market: Guildhall Place, Market Hill
Bristol, College Green, BS1 5TJ
Sheffield, Cathedral
Exeter, outside Central Station, Queens Street
Lancaster, outside Lancaster Castle
And (as announced previously) in London at:
The Ministry Of Justice (Thursday 20th)
The Peace Garden in Tavistock Square (Saturday 22nd)
The Home Office (Monday 24th) and
The Royal Courts of Justice (Wednesday 26th)
The action in Belfast on Saturday 22nd November will be the first Lift The Ban action in the city. There have been regular independently-organised sign-holding actions in Derry but no arrests or charges have been brought to date in the north of Ireland. Legal experts say that Police Service Northern Ireland need the proscription “like a hole in the head” and they suspect that PSNI were not consulted on the proscription by the Home Secretary.
Police Scotland have so far made no arrests at Lift The Ban actions in Edinburgh, although they have subsequently arrested and charged a seemingly random ten people from the 85 who took action in September. The Scottish Counter-Terrorism Board CONTEST has concluded that Palestine Action “has not been close to meeting the statutory definition of terrorism.” Earlier this month former diplomat Craig Murray filed a legal challenge against the ban in Scotland meaning there is the potential for a constitutional crisis if Scottish and English courts reach different decisions.
In Cardiff when people sit outside the Senedd building they will do so knowing that at the last Lift The Ban action there in July Welsh police arrested sign-holders under section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000 which carries a maximum penalty of 14 years in prison. They also held people in custody while raiding their houses and testing their food with geiger counters. However the same sitters were subsequently charged only with lesser section 13 offences (maximum penalty of six months in prison).
Leigh Evans, retired Emergency Nurse with extensive experience of working in the West Bank and Gaza, who took part in the Global Flotilla, and who will be taking action in Cardiff said:
“Protest and direct action are prerequisites for democracy in the face of fascism. Direct action is the only thing that has ever been proved to work against oppression and apartheid. Every right we have has been won for us through protest and direct action from the Levellers in the 17th century to the suffragettes in the early 1900s. Direct action and protests give us our human rights.”
Elle Miller, Railway Maintenance Worker, age 43 from Glasgow, explained why she will be taking part in both Edinburgh actions as well as the action in London on 26th:
“In today’s politics, it feels like the only way to influence decisions is to have millions in the bank. Without protest, slavery would still be legal, women couldn’t vote, and same-sex marriage would still be illegal. We know protest works precisely because successive governments are trying to criminalise it. If sitting peacefully with a cardboard sign makes me a terrorist, then I hope my great-grandchildren will be as proud of me as relatives of the suffragettes are today.
“The decision to proscribe Palestine Action was driven by corporate interests profiting from arms sales to those committing atrocities in Palestine and beyond. It is not illegal to challenge those interests or to campaign to change unjust laws. The Scottish Government has recognised the genocide in Palestine – so why are Police Scotland arresting peaceful protesters? Who do they serve: the UK Government, or the people of Scotland who oppose this ban?”
Oliver Baines OBE, 74, a farmer and retired charity CEO from Grampound Road who will be among those holding signs in Truro on the 18th, said:
“Devon and Cornwall Police pride themselves on their community policing, so a group of local residents sitting in silent vigil opposing genocide was always going to create a dilemma for them. When eight were arrested in July, the police were courteous and, in many cases, clearly uncomfortable. Their subsequent change of policy was typified by one officer who described the October protest as ‘lovely and peaceful’.
“Our argument was never with the police but with the UK Government, with its shameful attack on our civil liberties, and with its appalling record of complicity in the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the West Bank. Equating solidarity with Palestine and opposition to genocide with being a terrorist is a gross insult to all peace-loving people.”
LIFT THE BAN CAMPAIGN
So far over 2,000 people have been arrested under terrorism legislation for taking part in these now famous actions in which people sit silently holding handwritten cardboard signs saying “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.” Around 170 of these have so far been charged with section 13 offences under the Terrorism Act 2000, offences which carry a maximum six month prison sentence.
The demands of the Lift The campaign are firstly to lift the ban on Palestine Action and secondly to name the ongoing Israeli assault on the Palestinian people as a genocide and comply with the resulting legal obligations, including by ending all military trade and other military cooperation with Israel.
At the Court Of Appeal ruling on 15 October, Palestine Action co-founder Huda Ammori won two more grounds for her Judicial Review at the same time as the government lost their attempt to block the legal challenge of the ban, making
Last month the UN issued its draft report Gaza Genocide: A Collective Crime detailing the complicity of states including the UK in the destruction of Gaza. Amongst other things, the UK continued to supply arms including components for F-35 stealth bombers, undertook daily surveillance flights over Gaza for Israel, maintained normal trade relations, and allowed Israel to undertake international crimes with impunity.
The genocide continues to unfold in Gaza. Since October 11, the first full day of the ceasefire, Israel has killed at least 245 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded 627. Israel continues to attack Gaza, with at least three airstrikes on Wednesday. The UN says Israel is blocking vaccines and baby bottles. More than 1,500 buildings beyond the “yellow line” have been destroyed. And in the West Bank yesterday settlers set fire to vehicles, including dairy trucks.
CHORUS OF CRITICISM
This week the government’s proscription of Palestine Action has come under fire yet again from expert bodies both in the UK and internationally with the release of three separate reports. On Tuesday a panel of experts including a former MI6 director said terrorism laws needed rewriting as they had become too broad to keep the country safe, hitting out at the ‘serious property damage’ clause” which has resulted in a nonviolent domestic direct action group being designated as terrorists for the first time.
Later that same day it was revealed that an advisory body had told ministers that banning Palestine Action could backfire by inadvertently raising the group’s public profile, becoming “a flashpoint for significant controversy and criticism” of the government, heightening Muslim-Jewish community tensions, and being seen as evidence of bias towards Israel.
28 prisoners are currently being held in UK prisons without trial for allegedly taking part in actions claimed by Palestine action. They are known as the Filton 24 and the Brize Norton Five. Most will be held for two years without trial – exceeding the six month pre-trial custody limit – because the Crown Prosecution Service is claiming there is a “terrorist connection” on the basis of criminal damage. However no charges have been brought under the Terrorism Act against these prisoners and the actions took place before Palestine Action was proscribed by the government.
Six of these prisoners are now on a rolling hunger strike. The hunger strike started on Saturday 2nd November – Balfour Day – with two people after the Home Secretary failed to respond to their demands including immediate bail, access to documents necessary for the right to a fair trial and the de-proscription of Palestine Action. The strike is “rolling” because more people continue to join the strike as their demands remain unmet. The conditions of their detention have been criticised by UN experts in a letter to the UK government.
In August of this year T Hoxa of the Filton 24 went on hunger strike for 28 days, eventually winning most of her demands. According to Prisoners For Palestine, most of the 33 activists are expected to join the strike in coming weeks, in what could become the largest coordinated prisoners’ hunger strike since the 1981 Irish hunger strike led by Bobby Sands. For more information on the hunger strikers see Prisoners for Palestine.
Palestine Action joke that appeared in the UK satirical magazine ‘Private Eye’.Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
7/9/25 I am republishing this article with a few amendments. The claims that I make in this article are easily confirmed [9.29am ed: verified]. The implications? For a start, a huge amount of BS, corruption, deceit and subversion, etc is exposed.
5/9/25 There’s a part missing from this post i.e.it has been edited by someone else (to the benefit of the UK Labour Party and government).
In the original post I said that JCD uses an alternative reference while Rayner’s remarks use the normal, conventional reference.
Ed: That’s quite an achievement since I’ve got 2 Factor Authorisation (2FA) enabled, I would expect that my host must have been directed to edit it (i.e. by order of a government).
Later ed: And of course nothing is resolved by Rayner’s resignation. JCd was still murdered because of his name.
5/9/25 ENDS
I’ll be doing a message to Labour Party members and MPs explaining why I am so opposed to them, why I hold them responsible for Starmer’s actions (re: support, active participation and complicity in Israel’s Gaza genocide, attacks on the poor and vulnerable), how I intend to continue to oppose the UK Labour party, etc.
so here it is.
Keir “I support Zionism without Qualification” Starmer supporting genocide.
I started my first blog way back in 1998/99. While one of the earliest blogs, it was occasional and not particularly active. I did some politics and there is reason to believe that it was noticed by the UK Labour Party.
In 2002 I started opposing Tony Blair and Dubya Bush’s then intended Iraq war in NNTP newsgroups. I was active opposing that war and later moved on to opposing Tony Blair and his then Labour government.
Blair and his supporters started attacking me personally while hiding behind words and phrases i.e. words and phrases conveyed a different, deeper meaning apart from their obvious, superficial meaning to those that understood them e.g. Blair’s Home Secretary Cnut John Reid. Blair’s Home Secretaries were all cnuts and I helped despatch some of them.
So I was participating in the political process which is a perfectly legitimate and correct thing to do and the Labour party has started attacking me personally using nasty, dirty tactics, attacking me while hiding really.
Then along came Blair’s butler Ian Blair with so much shit, again attacking me personally while hiding. That whole terrorism shitshow and the murder of JCd with 1-3-7 bullets. JCd was murdered because of his name. His name identified a person by his location.
Deputy Labour Party Leader Angela Rayner calls for police to kill and harass innocent people.
Just recently UK Labour Party Deputy Leader Angela Rayner invoked the memory of JCd 137 to again identify a person by his location. I am forced to defend myself.
I have proved myself to be a formidable adversary capable of damaging the UK Labour Party under Tony Blair and now under fellow Zionist Keir “I support Zionism without qualification” Starmer. There are 2 reasons to it: to protect myself and to participate in the political process – to defend the poor and vulnerable like Palestinians suffering Israel’s genocide and the poor, sick and disabled in UK and to protect the planet from Capitalism / Neo-Liberalism.
Part of it is that I have repeatedly proved my analysis to be accurate and correct. I am intending to hurt the labour party in the months before the next general election although tbh it looks like Starmer is destroying the UK Labour Party and that there is no need. I admit that I sometimes don’t achieve all the projects that I set out to do but at least I have given myself enough time.
Starmer & Co are being hugely confrontational to the UK electorate atm. It’s dangerous because it can’t be maintained.
Starmer has captured the Labour Party to support his own narrow interests – to support Israel’s genocide. He’s said so hasn’t he? “I support genocide Zionism without qualification.”
I want international law upheld, that Starmer and his accomplices are prosecuted and imprisoned for war crimes.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
I intended to delete the following before publication, Oh well.
defend myself from personal attacks by prominent Labourists,
I am capable adversary
but have to continue
to defend myself
I have enough of an effect to significantly damage the Labour party
- it is actually what should happen in a democratic society, being active, participating in politics
why
a response to being
personally attackad by the whole Labour party
Ian Blair
glad that Fascnut is dead
John Reid
many Labour Home Secretaries
Angela Rayner - how should that be interpreted if not addressed personally and hostile, the relationship to JCd, that JCd was also killed to identify an individuals address. Why? The obvious answer is so that individual to be murdered. Huge double standards of course, politicians would hate for their home addresses to be published. Why should there be that double standard?
Starmer has captured teh Labour party to pursue his own interests - to support Israel's genocide
Starmer is being very confrontational against the majority of his electorate, can't maintain that 3 or 4 years until the next election
- support of Israel's genocide, use of terrorism laws against legitimate political opponents, protesters - attacks on the poor, sick and disabled
22/7/25 6.15pm
Uncertain if I made “… why I hold them responsible for Starmer’s actions … ” clear. Labour members and MPs are held responsible because they are facilitating Starmer & Co and it is done in their name.
