Lawyers for a co-founder of\u00a0<\/span>Palestine Action<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0have accused the home secretary of running a \u201ccynical media campaign\u201d which breaches her duty to the court in proceedings challenging the group\u2019s proscription.<\/span><\/p>\n In a letter sent to the government\u2019s legal department on behalf of Huda Ammori, who has been\u00a0<\/span>granted permission for a judicial review<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0of the decision to ban the group under the Terrorism Act, her lawyers say Yvette Cooper\u2019s public statements are not backed by her disclosures at the high court.<\/span><\/p>\n Birnberg Peirce write:<\/span><\/p>\n While some of the evidence at the judicial review permission hearing was in closed court, so neither Ammori nor the lawyers representing her in open court have seen it, the letter states that \u201canything that your client feels able to share with the media should be in your client\u2019s open case, even by way of gist\u201d.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n It also highlights<\/span>\u00a0an opinion piece by Cooper in the Observer<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0in which she referred to \u201cdisturbing information given to me that covered ideas and planning for future attacks [by Palestine Action]\u201d.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n NB <\/strong>I gave my own paragraph by paragraph response to that opinion piece in my August 21st post, Yvette Cooper takes to The Observer<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n Back to the Guardian …<\/p>\n It says this has not been raised in open court nor have allegations made by Cooper, and also<\/span>\u00a0reportedly by Keir Starmer<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0to Labour\u2019s national executive committee (NEC), that Palestine Action targeted Jewish businesses. The letter says Cooper was \u201cwell aware\u201d that the Jewish business in question was a landlord of a subsidiary of the Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit Systems.<\/span><\/p>\n In my August 21 post I too raised this issue:<\/p>\n Back to the Guardian …<\/p>\n Additionally, [the Birnberg Peirce letter] cites<\/span>\u00a0a report in the Times<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0which said Home Office officials had briefed it that Palestine Action \u201cmay be funded by Iran\u201d. A Whitehall intelligence assessment released to the high court stated that it was \u201cprimarily funded by donations\u201d, including via crowdfunding, and also received revenue through the \u201csale of merchandise\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n On August 21 I cited Craig Murray who, having seen a redacted Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre report – almost certainly the “Whitehall intelligence assessment” referred to here – said:<\/p>\n Back to the Guardian …<\/p>\n The letter states: <\/span><\/p>\n Last month, Palestine Action became<\/span>\u00a0the first direct action group to be proscribed<\/a><\/strong>, placing it alongside the likes of Islamic State and National Action. This week, Amnesty International UK and Liberty were granted permission to intervene in the judicial review, which is expected to be heard in November.<\/span><\/p>\n The government has been approached for comment.<\/span><\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" UK home secretary Yvette Cooper The Guardian today … Palestine Action lawyers accuse Yvette Cooper of \u2018cynical media campaign\u2019 Exclusive: Home secretary \u2018breaching duty to court\u2019 by making claims about reason for group\u2019s ban that she has not disclosed in … Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-153260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-middle-east","category-politics-uk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153260"}],"version-history":[{"count":34,"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":153414,"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153260\/revisions\/153414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelcityscribblings.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}At the centre of your client\u2019s media campaign is an attempt to persuade the public that Palestine Action was proscribed for reasons which she is unable to reveal publicly and which are centred on violence and injuries against people.<\/span><\/h6>\n
These claims about the reason for Proscription Review Group\u2019s recommendation for the proscription of Palestine Action are misleading in light of open (public) disclosure.<\/span><\/h6>\n
It is clear from the open disclosure that the basis for the recommendation was serious damage to property caused by Palestine Action and not violence against people.<\/span><\/h6>\n
Indeed the central advice to your client was that proscribing Palestine Action would advance \u2018the deterrent message of stating clearly that serious damage to property to advance a cause, amounts to terrorism regardless of the cause\u2019.<\/em><\/span><\/h6>\n
Since Palestine Action\u2019s raison d\u2019etre<\/em>\u00a0 is to make life hard for the war criminals in Palestine and their friends on this sceptred isle, it will of course target Israeli business interests on British soil\u00a0<\/span>\u2013 and since Israel is a racist ethno-state, these will be disproportionately Jewish. What Cooper seeks to imply \u2013 deliberately, recklessly, despicably, and wholly of a piece with her government\u2019s efforts to paint attacks on Israel as antisemitic \u2013 is that Palestine Action targets such businesses because they are\u00a0Jewish owned,<\/em>\u00a0as distinct from Israeli owned.<\/h6>\n
If Palestine Action deliberately attacked people \u2026\u00a0\u00a0had foreign funding \u2026\u00a0\u00a0attacked random Jewish businesses \u2026\u00a0\u00a0planned a big terrorist act … the JTAC report would say so. It says nothing of the sort.<\/h6>\n
This cynical media campaign reflects a fundamental lack of respect for court proceedings, and either indicates an attempt by your client to influence media coverage through assertions which she cannot evidence, or is reflective of a serious breach of her duty of candour in these proceedings \u2026<\/span><\/h6>\n
The proper place for your client to advance her case is in court. Your client\u2019s approach in relation to briefing the media with a wholly different basis for proscription is entirely improper and a breach of her duty to the court. If your client has evidence to support her assertions, this ought to have been disclosed. As she has not, she must cease her misleading campaign immediately.<\/span><\/h6>\n
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