London, United Kingdom – Margaret Owen, a 94-year-old Jewish human rights barrister, has been trying to get arrested for months. She has attended about a dozen protests wearing a sign reading “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action” in London and has had a placard with those words attached to a window at her home since the group was proscribed under the Terrorism Act in the UK in July 2025. But unlike thousands of others who have been detained for showing support for Palestine Action, officers had not – until Sunday – hauled her into a police van.
Merseyside Police said 82 people were arrested in the same protest “on suspicion of wearing/carrying an article supporting a proscribed organisation” and have since been released on bail. The Metropolitan Police did not comment on Owen specifically, but told Al Jazeera that, in London, “officers may not have witnessed an offence being committed, or the circumstances may not have met the necessary legal threshold for an arrest at that time”. Owen said she wanted to be detained because the involvement of legal professionals lends a growing civil disobedience campaign “some sort of authority”.
The rallies have been organised by Defend Our Juries, a UK-based activist group demanding the UK lifts the ban on Palestine Action. Founded in 2020, Palestine Action’s stated objective has been to counter Israeli war crimes – and what it says is British complicity in them – by targeting weapons manufacturers and associated companies. Its main target is Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest arms company, which has several facilities in the UK.
Several people who participated in raids claimed by Palestine Action are in jail, some having been sentenced as “terrorists”. Many of those who have been arrested for showing support are pensioners, overwhelmingly for holding signs with the same seven words as the ones on Owen’s placard. Doctors, teachers, lawyers, vicars, magistrates (many of them retired), a former adviser to King Charles and a Massive Attack singer are also among the diverse group, as is Tim Crossland, a coleader of Defend Our Juries and former government lawyer.
As with the sanctions he announced against illegal Israeli settlements, his comments marked a departure from his predecessors. Before Labour’s change of guard, few lawmakers under then-Prime Minister Keir Starmer criticised Israel’s conduct or the ban on Palestine Action. Just 10 voted against it in the House of Commons, compared with 276 for.
Then-Home Secretary Yvette Cooper ignored warnings from campaign groups, the United Nations human rights chief and leading politicians and peers that the move misused counterterrorism legislation. He was referring to another case expected this year; Palestine Action’s cofounder Huda Ammori has been given permission to challenge the ban at the UK’s highest court. Miliband, who is Jewish, has credited his late mother’s influence when explaining the UK’s new policies sanctioning Israel as it continues a genocidal campaign in Gaza.
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