Britain calls some anti-Israel protests a form of terrorism. Is it state overreach?

When Francesca Nadin visited her friend Heba Muraisi in a British prison a week ago, she said the 31-year-old former florist and lifeguard was unrecognizable.

“I felt if I hugged her too hard, I would just break her, that’s how skinny she was,” said Nadin.

Imprisoned for protesting Israel's war on Gaza, Muraisi had only been drinking water mixed with salt and augmented with vitamins since early November, an astoundingly long time to survive without solid food.

During their conversation, Nadin feared Muraisi might only be hours away from death.

But last Wednesday night, on Day 73 of her hunger strike, Muraisi and two other prisoners, Kamran Ahmed and Lewie Chiaramello, announced they were ending their protest against their treatment by the government of Prime Minister Keir Starmer and would start feeding themselves again.

Not since Irish Republican Army prisoner Kieran Doherty survived for 73 days before dying on a hunger strike in 1981 had anyone in a U.K. prison demonstrated such endurance. 

Supporters of Muraisi and the others claimed victory after The Times newspaper reported that Elbit, a subsidiary of Israel’s largest arms producer, lost out on a more than 2-billion-pound ($3.8 billion Cdn) British defence contract.

Heba Muraisi, 31, recently ended a long hunger strike in support of Palestine Action that friends say left her close to death. (Submitted)

There's no direct evidence the hunger strikers' actions influenced the government’s decision. But activists took credit anyway.

“Even when you are in prison, you can still act to disrupt the Israeli war machine,” said Nadin.

'Terror' protests?

The hunger strike came amid a furious debate in the U.K. over what constitutes reasonable opposition to Israel’s ongoing military attacks in Gaza and its historic treatment of Palestinians.  

At the heart of the issue is the question of when protests become acts of terrorism.

In July, the British government took the unprecedented step of proscribing the protest group Palestine Action as a terrorist organization.   

For years, members of Palestine Action have carried out escalating actions and vandalism against Israel-related companies operating in Britain. Their direct action campaign culminated with several members of the group breaking into a U.K. military base in June and vandalizing British military aircraft, which included spraying them with red paint.

Francesca Nadin, a supporter of Palestine Action and activists who staged a hunger strike, recently spoke to CBC News outside the British High Court in London. (Lyzaville Sale/CBC)

Security Minister Dan Jarvis told the House of Commons in September that the group’s actions go far beyond typical protests by endangering lives and property, and as such “satisfied the relevant tests in the Terrorism Act 2000 and should be proscribed.”

As a consequence, anyone holding membership in the group or even showing signs of support for Palestine Action can now face up to 14 years in prison.

Mass arrests

The designation has led to more than 2,400 arrests by British police, many involving people simply holding up placards saying "I support Palestine Action."

A panel of British judges is currently considering whether to have the designation overturned, after human rights groups such as Amnesty International intervened.

Police officers detain a protester as supporters from Defend Our Juries stage a demonstration in Tavistock Square on Nov. 22, 2025, as part of their campaign to lift the ban on Palestine Action ahead of a judicial review at London's High Court. (Jack Taylor/Reuters)

The three hunger strikers were not part of the incident involving the vandalization of the military aircraft but were convicted of earlier offences, including burglary and criminal damage at an Elbit facility near Bristol. 

All have been in jail for more than a year without trial and were protesting the long wait, as well as their conditions in prison. They also demanded a meeting with government ministers, who refused.

“This is just the latest step in the persecution of people who dissent on the government stance on Gaza,” said Nadin, who was previously found guilty of trespassing and vandalism related to actions she took against British companies with Israeli links.

Polarizing proscription

The issue of proscribing Palestine Action has been polarizing.

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U.K.-based human rights groups have accused the Starmer government of misusing the anti-terrorism legislation, while supporters of Israel want to see the crackdown against the protesters go even further.

Yasmine Ahmed of Human Rights Watch said labelling protesters as terrorists simply for holding up a sign puts the British government in terrible company.

“It really places them in a bucket with Hungary, Russia, Hong Kong and China, [where] they have used counter-terrorism measures to suppress dissent,” Ahmed told CBC News in London.

She said police have all the powers they need to deal with protesters who cause vandalism,  without resorting to trampling on civil liberties.

“Terrorism should be equated with the most serious offences, [and] what this does is fundamentally undermine the concept of fighting what a terrorist is, and equates it to people holding signs,” said Ahmed.

Yasmine Ahmed, the U.K. director of Human Rights Watch, told CBC that British police have all the powers they need to deal with protesters who cause vandalism without resorting to trampling on civil liberties. (Lyzaville Sale/CBC)

Recent public opinion surveys reflect the deep divisions in British society over Palestinian Action and more broadly over Israel’s actions in Gaza. 

A YouGov survey in October 2025 reported that 33 per cent of Britons believe it was correct to label the group a terrorist organization, while 27 per cent believe it was wrong to do so.

Other YouGov surveys, however, show there's stronger public support for the causes the group is championing. For example, a majority of the British public reportedly favour a ban on arms shipments to Israel, and public sympathy for the “Palestinian side” reached its highest recorded level of 37 per cent in mid-2025.

Israel’s supporters

Pro-Israel advocates in the U.K. Parliament are among those pushing hardest for the Starmer government to continue with its crackdown on Palestine Action, among them British peer John Woodcock, also known as Lord Walney.

Former Conservative prime minister Boris Johnson appointed Woodcock as the U.K.’s Independent Adviser on Political Violence in 2020 and he continued to serve in the role under Starmer until February 2025.

In a 2024 report, Woodcock specifically named Palestine Action an extremist group. Following the group's airbase vandalism in July 2025, Woodcock strongly backed the Labour government decision to designate it a terrorist organization, and continues to do so. 

John Woodcock, Lord Walney, formerly acted as the British government's independent advisor on political violence and disruption. He supports the proscription of Palestine Action as a terrorist organization. (Lord Walney)

“One of the signs that proscription has been relatively effective is that you have seen a reduction for a while in the number of attacks,” Woodcock told CBC News in an interview.

He praised the Labour government for essentially ignoring the hunger strikers and refusing to be swayed by them.

“It was a stupid stunt,” he said. 

Nonetheless, Woodcock acknowledged the bar for “terrorist” activities may need to be re-examined, saying that police resources are being wasted on supervising Palestine Action protesters who are simply holding up signs at sit-ins and other protests.

He says one option is to give police more powers to crack down on recruitment, fundraising and publicizing the activities of a proscribed group, while making the penalty for simply holding up a sign less severe.

“It seems blindingly obvious, I think to most people, that an organization like Palestine Action shouldn't be free to broadcast their crimes on social media,” he said.

Enormous protests

Demonstrations in Britain against Israel’s military actions in Gaza and its decades-long occupation of the Palestinian territories have turned into some of the largest anti-war movements in U.K. history.

The last major demonstration in London in October 2025 drew more than 600,000 people, according to protest leaders, although police estimates put the number at closer to 100,000.

Since Hamas's attacks on Israel in October 2023, which killed roughly 1,200 people, Israel's Defence Forces have bombed and conducted a devastating ground campaign in Gaza that has killed more than 71,000 people, according to Gaza health authorities.

Most of the health-care facilities in the enclave have been destroyed, hundreds of thousands of people are living in tents and starvation has stalked survivors. Even since a ceasefire came into effect, Gaza health authorities report Israeli attacks have killed more than 440 people, including 100 children.

Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, Jewish settlers have intensified their attacks on Palestinian communities by destroying homes and businesses and leaving hundreds wounded.

Some U.K. observers believe critics of the hunger strikers shouldn’t be so quick to minimize the impact of their actions.

“On social media, the actions of the hunger strikers and the broader issue of pro-Palestinian activism resonated widely and extensively,” said Bart Cammaerts, a professor of politics and communications at the London School of Economics, in an email to CBC.

Anti-Israel protesters demonstrate in front of the British High Court on Jan. 14. (Lyzaville Sale/CBC)

“What hunger strikes achieve ... is to generate solidarity with the activists and their cause, to direct public attention to the plight of the jailed activists and to highlight the unreasonableness of the government vis-a-vis these activists, who have still not been found guilty of anything,” Cammaerts said. 

The focus will now shift to the British High Court ‘s judicial review of the decision to proscribe Palestine Action. The hearing was held in early December and the judges’ decision could come at any time. 

Given this is the first instance where a British government has designated a direct action protest group a terror organization, whatever decision the justices make will have far-reaching implications for human rights and the future of protests against Israel.

Meanwhile, Heba Muraisi and the other two hunger strikers are now in a prison infirmary and going through a “refeeding” process, according to Francesca Nadin.

“I spoke to [Muraisi] and she was feeling very positive about everything she has achieved through the hunger strike,” said Nadin.