Transverse Process?

At Woolwich Crown Court yesterday, Judge Andrew Lees discharged the jury in the trial of Kamran Ahmed, Zahra Farooq, Moiz Ibrahim, Liam Mullany, Heba Muraisi and Qesser Zuhrah, the third batch of the Filton 25 activists against Elbit Systems to be put in the dock. Having spent 15 months on remand, during which they nearly died on hunger strike to demand as little as a trial date, they were released on bail before sitting through the seven week trial that has ended like this. Yet the Crown Prosecution Service intends to force a retrial, no doubt this time without the unusual decision of Judge Lees to allow the Defence to discuss the reasons for the action, and certainly without any mention of the absolute right of a jury to acquit no matter what.

At the same time, over at the Supreme Court, extremely hostile judges were making it effectively impossible for learned counsel to argue against the proscription of Palestine Action, a proscription ostensibly for having sprayed paint onto planes at RAF Brize Norton, planes that were simply repainted and used as normal. Hardly any charge that has been brought against any Palestine Action defendant has ever resulted in a conviction, and the most serious, ever, was that of Samuel Corner, only by a majority verdict, of grievous bodily harm without intent, since the same jury had acquitted him of GBH with intent after Sergeant Kate Evans had walked unaided out of Accident and Emergency. When a small hairline fracture to her transverse process was identified, then she was advised to take paracetamol. It took two attempts to convict Corner of having assaulted her at all. Take a sledgehammer to that.

Yet that is the worst thing of which anyone associated with Palestine Action has ever been accused. Contrast it with already rearming Argentina in anticipation of the next Falklands War. Or with the events of 1 April 2024, when James Kirby, James Henderson and John Chapman, unarmed British veterans who were delivering humanitarian aid, were bombed three times to make sure that they were dead, as could not have been an accident. Yvette Cooper proscribed Palestine Action in order to prejudice the first court case, and she committed contempt of court by justifying that decision in The Observer. But she is right-wing Labour royalty, so Andy Burnham has observed convention by demoting her first rather than just sacking straight away. Therefore, he feels obliged to contest this appeal rather than risk her resignation, after which she might not even stand down in 2029 and end 32 years in which she had cut her own majority from 15,426 to 6630. Meanwhile, though, Benjamin Netanyahu and his supporters have held only 53 seats in the Knesset to 48 for his opponents, of those 48 the powerbrokers are the record 19 members of the Arab-led parties, even JD Vance is calling for a changed relationship with Israel, and even Donald Trump has announced the impending end of aid to it. The caravan moves on, even while the dog still barks.