{"id":108971,"date":"2026-08-22T21:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T21:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/108971\/"},"modified":"2026-08-22T21:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T21:56:11","slug":"barclays-five-palestine-activists-not-sentenced-as-terrorists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/108971\/","title":{"rendered":"Barclays Five Palestine activists not sentenced as terrorists"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tNews<\/a><\/p>\n

Lively protest outside the court to support group who sprayed red paint at a branch of Barclays Bank<\/p>\n

By Camilla Royle <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tDownloading PDF. Please wait…<\/p>\n

Saturday 22 August 2026<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tIssue <\/a>
\n\t\t\t\t\"Protest\"Protest<\/p>\n

Protesters gathered outside the court to support the Barclays Five<\/p>\n

Palestine activists in Lancashire were relieved to hear on Friday that a judge had decided not to sentence the Barclays Five as terrorists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They were supported during their court hearing by the wider Palestine movement. From outside Preston Crown Court, Brian reported to Socialist Worker that there was a \u201clively and noisy protest\u201d of around 150 people.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They brought banners reading, \u201cOpposing genocide is not terrorism\u201d, \u201cLancaster stands with the Barclays Five\u201d and \u201cWe are protesters, not terrorists\u201d. Several people dressed as Suffragettes. <\/p>\n

\u201cOn the demonstration were protesters from Bradford, Sheffield, Liverpool, Lancaster, Morecambe and local Unite Community trade unionists from Preston,\u201d said Brian.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cA big roar went up when it was announced that the court had ruled that the Barclays Five will not be sentenced as \u2018terrorists\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the end of the protest police arrested seven peaceful activists for carrying placards supporting Palestine Action.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Barclays Five, Brendon O\u2019Hagan, Amanda Kelly, Hmeera Atiqnisar, Mohammed Malik, and Alma Yaniv, were found guilty of criminal damage in June this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In August 2024, they sprayed red paint at a branch of Barclays Bank in Burnley to raise awareness of its role in the genocide in Gaza. Barclays at the time held shares in Israeli weapons firm Elbit Systems, which it then sold in October that year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After the group were found guilty, a judge threatened to add a \u201cterrorism connection\u201d to their sentence.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It is a chilling reminder of the deepening crackdown against people who take action for Palestine. <\/p>\n

The jury were not told the group could be sentenced as terrorists when they delivered their verdict. And their actions came before the proscription last year of Palestine Action under the Terrorism Act 2000.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In June, four members of the Filton 25 had a terrorism connection<\/a> added at sentencing in similar circumstances and were handed lengthy prison sentences.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, Judge Altham ruled on Friday that the actions of the Barclays Five didn\u2019t warrant a terrorism sentence. They await sentencing next month.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A statement from the Barclays Five read, \u201cThe proscription of Palestine Action<\/a>, the arrests of over 3,500 people under the Terrorism Act for holding signs and the sentencing of direct action activists as terrorists, are all tools being used by the state to protect the Israeli weapons industry and continue its role in the ongoing genocide in Gaza.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe state is doing everything possible to deter direct action for Palestine precisely because it has been so effective against the Israeli war machine, but we could never regret trying to stop a genocide.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"News Lively protest outside the court to support group who sprayed red paint at a branch of Barclays…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108972,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[21264],"tags":[3343,32,5958],"class_list":["post-108971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barclays","tag-barclays","tag-palestine","tag-palestine-action"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/117141398143739093","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}