On July 5, Keir Starmer's Labour government banned Palestine Action (PA), designating the British pro-Palestinian advocacy group as a terrorist organization, alongside Hamas and the Russian mercenary group Wagner. In June, members of PA – founded in 2020 – entered the Royal Air Force base at Brize Norton, 120 kilometers northwest of London, where they damaged aircraft. Other activists took part in an August 2024 action against the Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit Systems in Bristol. PA "has been involved in violent attacks" and has caused "major criminal damage to national security infrastructure," said Yvette Cooper, who was the home secretary until the reshuffle on September 6.

Two months later, the British authorities are still struggling to justify the decision, as hundreds of ordinary citizens had been arrested for continuing to support PA, and public confusion was mounting amid horror at the famine and massacres in Gaza. At the end of July, the British High Court accepted a legal challenge to the group's ban after being petitioned by one of PA's founders, Huda Ammori. Her lawyers argued that banning PA violated freedom of expression and stifled legitimate protest against the war in Gaza.

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