Dear Yvette Cooper,
Just Stop Oil and Youth Demand stand in opposition to the UK government’s complicity in genocide in Gaza and in solidarity with Palestine Action. We know who the real terrorists are and we are not fooled by your pearl clutching expressions of horror and alarm about some red paint.
We suggest you take a closer look at the news. At the latest count Israel has killed over 56,500 people in Gaza, most of them women and children, through bombing and direct execution. It has forcibly displaced 1.9 million people as it has raised their homes, hospitals and schools to the ground. By denying entry to aid, it is now engaged in a campaign of systemic starvation, while funding anti-hamas militias to sow chaos and confusion. This is terrorism.
Over the past 21 months, including 12 months during which you were in office, the UK government has provided arms, military, intelligence and diplomatic cover to the Israeli government as it seeks to systematically exterminate the Palestinian people. In so doing the UK government is acting against the wishes of the vast majority of British people, in contravention of international law and in violation of fundamental British values. It is utterly immoral.
By contrast, Palestine Action’s bold and principled campaign of resistance against the Israeli war machine in Britain, has focussed on directly shutting down the production of Israeli weapons that are being used to bomb women and children in Gaza. In this respect Palestine Action are following in the footsteps of the Labour movement, the civil rights movement and the Suffragettes, whose colours you so proudly wore in Parliament not so long ago. They are also the latest in a long line of peace activists who have taken action at airbases. Yes, this has involved property damage and it has cost the corporate interests that you represent dearly. But it is not terrorism as well you know.
Since juries have repeatedly acquitted activists for similar actions, using the protest at Brize Norton as an excuse for proscription is manufactured outrage. It’s an excuse to do what Israeli and arms trade lobbyists, such as Lord Walney, have long advocated. Having paid for your election, their payday is due.
We understand your embarrassment, that a few plucky scooter riders could infiltrate an RAF base and vandalise some planes opaquely owned by a hedge fund and leased to the RAF via Air Tanker Ltd. But we all know that the state of our national security is not your primary concern. Rather it is the growing dissent about UK support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza and by extention the whole Israeli settler colonial project. But this move to ban Palestine Action will only serve to drive increased support for the Palestine movement.
We call on you to immediately halt your plans for the proscription of Palestine Action and we call on MPs to publicly oppose and vote against the proscription of Palestine Action.
We stand in full solidarity with Palestine Action and call on all people of conscience to show their support for the group. We are all Palestine Action.
Just Stop Oil
Youth Demand
