To wonder why so many pensioners are supporting Palestine Action, even willing to risk prison for it ?

Surely this is a huge red flag whatever views anyone may have about PA? What does this mean for our justice system?

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-
news/2025/nov/25/removal-judge-palestine-action-ban-legal-challenge-justice-chamberlain

Yes, the Guardian’s a really impartial player in this game.

Because they know

This is a very good article in The Guardian on how different Governments are dealing with Pro Palestinian demonstrations
How the strength of people around the world are showing support
Often in the face of clamps downs on free speech

"PA was trying to prevent arms companies based in the UK from supplying the Israeli state with weapons systems to be used in carrying out what is widely agreed to be a genocide of the Palestinian people."

Firstly - the conflict has not been classed as a "Genocide".

Secondly - direct exports of F-35 components are included in the government’s arms partial suspension, but concerns remain that parts from the UK will later be sold to Israel despite allegations that the aircraft are being used to violate human rights in Gaza. As the UK is a major supplier of components and subsystems to the US arms industry, and the US is Israel’s largest arms supplier, many arms exports from the UK to Israel go into US-made weapons that are ultimately sold to Israel. The UK has no control over this.

Mr Lammy said: “The global F-35 supply chain is vital for the security of the UK, our allies and Nato.”

PA was trying to prevent arms companies based in the UK from supplying the Israeli state with weapons systems to be used in carrying out what is widely agreed to be a genocide of the Palestinian people.

They damaged military planes that they thought were being used to refuel Israeli bombers but they weren't.

They attacked a Jewish business with no connections to Elbit

They put a police officer in hospital

Their co-founder is due to appear in court for expressing support for Hamas

One of their prominent members has just been arrested for supporting Hamas, and she has also dabbled in Holocaust denial.

They had planned future attacks on UK RAF bases, and pose a threat to our national security at a time of heightened tensions with Russia.

They truly are the heroes of this piece.

Bizarre set of beliefs seem to have prompted this thread.

There were plenty of older people taking part in Extinction Rebellion protests (eg "Extincttion Rebellion pensioners" & "XR grandparents"), and associated actions like the ones done by Just Stop Oil... did you just miss seeing any of the many articles about this phenonomen? https://www.theguardian.com/environment/shortcuts/2019/oct/15/how-older-people-became-the-heroes-of-extinction-rebellion

People involved in Palestine Action, and those who don't think PA should have been labelled a 'terrorist' group just because they were taking effective direct action, do not routinely 'support Hamas'. PA was trying to prevent arms companies based in the UK from supplying the Israeli state with weapons systems to be used in carrying out what is widely agreed to be a genocide of the Palestinian people.

When another group (of women, many of them older) did something very similar 30 years ago, to prevent British weapons being used by the Inonesian state vs the people of East Timor, they were actually found not guilty in a court of law, as it was obvious that by taking this action, they were preventing a bigger crime from being committed.

We live in an increasingly repressive environment nowadays, with social and environmental justice campaigners being smeared as 'domestic extremists' and 'terrorists' by the UK Government, which has chosen to prioritise the profits of British arms companies over ethics, human rights and free speech. Have a read: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seeds_of_Hope

😆

No I think it is you who has "confusion" with points.

Saying that "Hamas was voted in" infers that the Palestinians wanted them in charge. It was a flawed voting system that caused the problems.

Neither Hamas nor Fatah (the moderates) wanted a power-sharing deal but Hamas used violence to take control.

Quite right. It's a weird twisting of what zionism is..heck, theres even the cultural zionism proposed by Ahad Ha'am which didn't even require the establishment of a Jewish state to fulfill its mission. But that kind if nuance doesnt reach tiktok. Better just to hate the evil 'zios'. Even better to say zionist when you mean jewish and then bleat 'they always accuse me of antisemitism when im just criticising zionism'

No. There was already a civil war between Palestinian Zionists and Palestinian Arabs in 1947 after the partition plan was rejected by the Arabs (with no counter proposal, just a flat no to any jewish rule anywhere in mandatory Palestine).
The day the Brits left, the Palestinian zionists declared the state of israel. The Palestinian Arabs did not declare a state of palestine since that had never been the aim at that point (evidenced by lack.of Palestinian state between1948 and 1967).
The surrounding arab armies then invaded the new state of israel with the aim to destroy it.
Just a reminder that the jews were 100% ethnically cleansed (and massacred)from every square inch held by the Arabs in 1948 including the jewish quarter of the old city of Jerusalem.
People were displaced on both sides.
Plus some 700,000 jews living in Arab counties were forcibly expelled and displaced (as well as murdered in pogroms), most coming to Israel.

Don't you want to put your energies into stopping active genocides?
If its only about preventing genocide that is....

You're asking why people are racist?

We can all see what you said without you making ineffective guesses at people's political inclination. Anyone can identify racism you know, voting pattern doesn't come into it.

@RedAdmirals

Hamas were never directly voted in.

I didn’t say they were directly voted in. I said voted in. I see your continuous confusion with points makes it super difficult to follow any disagreement.

Not what I said. Read back. Jewish people stand by their homeland. Just as I would for my country. I won’t say typical lefty trying to shut me down but you get it!

This is what happens when people take the word 'Zionist' and misuse it as a synonym for 'evil supporter of Netanyahu'. Then people who hang around with those people, never stop to think whether that is actually what Zionism means. They then end up believing that when they hear that the majority of Jews are Zionists, that that means that those Jews are evil supporters of Netanyahu.

Instead they should have thought 'hmm that doesn't sound right, perhaps that's not what Jews mean when they refer to themselves as Zionists'. But they've probably also been hanging around with antisemites who have long used the word Zionist as a code word for Jew so seeing Zionist and Jew used interchangeably means that they didn't even notice what was going on.

They were being groomed into antisemitism, and now they genuinely think that the majority of Jews are just fine with stealing and killing.

Essentially you're saying that most Jews think stealing and killing is ok.

There's a word for that kind of viewpoint. What could it be? Starts with an R I think...

@Sometimeswinning "Please don’t forget my point was why they were voted in."

Hamas were never directly voted in.

In January 2006 the Palestinian territories held parliamentary elections. Hamas won a bare plurality of votes (44 percent to the more moderate Fatah party’s 41 percent) but, given the electoral system, a strong majority of seats (74 to 45).

Neither party were keen to share power and fighting broke out between the two.

When a unity government was finally formed in June 2007, Hamas broke the deal, started murdering Fatah members, and, in the end, took total control of the Gaza Strip.

Those who weren’t killed fled to the West Bank, and the territories have remained split ever since

If you think Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state then you, like the majority of Jews, are a Zionist.

Nothing about stealing or killing.

You’ve confused the two. Israel had its land. Deserved it. I have not said I disagree with that.

I can also see that extra land has been taken. Palastinians have been made homeless and killed. Not during an official war. But just on a daily basis. But I’m guessing that’s of no consequence to you. That’s your take. This is mine.