When 'Terror' Labels Backfire
Huda Ammori, co-founder of Palestine Action, recently celebrated a High Court victory after a bid to classify the group as a 'terrorist organisation' was ruled unlawful. According to mainstream reports, this marks a win for free speech, suggesting the government’s attempt to criminalize direct action against those arming Israel has, in fact, backfired spectacularly. One might wonder why London
officials consistently misjudge the resilience of solidarity movements, especially when their strategies are plucked straight from an old, well-worn manual. This isn't merely a legal hiccup for the UK Home Office; it’s a rerun of colonial tactics perfected over decades. Consider the British use of 'terrorist' labels against anti-colonial movements in 1940s Palestine or against Mau Mau fighters in
Kenya in the 1950s—groups now recognized as freedom fighters, not fanatics. The template remains the same: delegitimize resistance through linguistic weaponization. Such designations are less about actual terror and more about enabling governments to maintain commercial ties, such as the UK’s reported £38 billion in trade with Israel over the last decade, without public inconvenience. The
judiciary, in this instance, simply confirmed what history repeatedly demonstrates: conflating activism with extremism only inflames the very sentiments it seeks to extinguish. From the anti-apartheid movement to Sinn Fein in the 1980s, attempts to paint legitimate political grievances as 'terrorism' have consistently failed to suppress their core message, merely delaying the inevitable