I am confident that over 2 million people in the UK have shared thoughts on the Genocide in Gaza that are stronger than anything Natalie Strecker has expressed.
I am quite certain that I am one of those 2 million.
Yet Natalie Strecker, an avowed pacifist, today faces up to ten years in prison under the Terrorism Act when the verdict in her case comes in.
Strecker is charged with eliciting support for Hamas and Hezbollah, based on 8 tweets, cherry-picked by police and prosecutors from an astounding 51,000 tweets she sent, mainly from the Jersey Palestine Solidarity Committee account.
The tweets were rather rattled off in court and referred to occasionally again in whole and in part. There may be minor inaccuracies not affecting sense, but this is the best reconstruction of those tweets that I can make (they were not displayed to the public):
“People will be individually resisting: otherwise we would be asking them to submit to genocide on their knees”
“Solidarity with the people of Lebanon and Hezbollah has the right to resist in international law, I remind you the occupier does not, and are legally obligated to try to prevent Genocide.”
“Solidarity with the resistance. In the same way that the resistance fought the Nazis in Europe, we must support the fight against the Nazis of our generation”.
“Resistance is their legal right under moral and international law. If you don’t want resistance, then don’t create the circumstances which require it. Solidarity with the Resistance.”
“This nonsense our nation has descended into, where one side is committing genocide, and the other is proscribed for fighting it. I believe Hezbollah may be Palestine’s last hope”.
“Hamas the resistance did not break out of their concentration camp to attack Jews as Jews. We can debate whether armed resistance is legitimate. Of course there should be no attacks on civilians.”
“I am sick of the MSM propaganda about “Hamas-run health ministry figures”. Hamas is the government in Gaza. Every health ministry in the world is run by its government.”
“Are you awake? So it is down to ordinary people like you an me to end it. We must take our power back. Join me in solidarity with the people of Lebanon and Palestine. Solidarity with the Resistance.”
That is it. The prosecution case is that these tweets, both collectively and individually, amount to an invitation of support for Hamas and Hezbollah resulting in up to ten years in jail in Jersey, or 14 years in jail on the UK mainland.
The prosecution explicitly stated, and the judge notably intervened to make sure that everybody understood, that it is the offence of supporting terrorism to state that the Palestinians have the right to armed resistance in international law.
Judge John Saunders interrupted the prosecution to ask whether they were saying that he would be guilty of support for terrorism if, in a lecture, he told an international law class that Palestinians have the right to armed resistance in international law.
After some kerfuffle when faced with such an awkward question, the prosecution replied that yes, it could be the offence to tell law students that.
I should point out, at risk of dying in jail, that the Palestinians are beyond doubt an occupied people in international law, and equally beyond doubt an occupied people have the right of armed resistance.
To state that the Palestinians have the right of armed resistance in international law is not in the least controversial as a statement of law. A few Zionist nutters would try to differ, but 95% of international lawyers on this planet would agree.
I assume by perfectly logical extension that this means the prosecution must believe it is a terrorist crime in UK law, for example, to quote UN General Assembly Resolution 37/43, which:
2. Reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial and foreign domination and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle;
3. Reaffirms the inalienable right of the Namibian people, the Palestinian people and all peoples under foreign and colonial domination to self-determination, national independence, territorial integrity, national unity and sovereignty without outside interference;
It is also worth stating that on Friday the prosecution stated, in these precise words, that “Resistance is synonymous with Hamas and Hezbollah” and that any support for, or justification of, Palestinian resistance is support for a proscribed organisation.
To repeat, there are millions of people in the UK who have stated stronger things than the tweets above. Including me. And, as the defence pointed out repeatedly, just eight tweets had been found after hundreds of hours of police time, and found amidst tens of thousands of other tweets on the Middle East, hundreds of which specifically urge non-violence.
So why are the police doing this to Natalie? Why did six armed police storm her apartment and rouse her at 7am a year ago, seizing all her electronics and papers, arresting her and not allowing her to have a pee without leaving the bathroom door open so she could be observed?
This is where the story gets very dark indeed.
This is not a local Jersey initiative.
The prosecution is directed from London and Alison Morgan KC, senior Treasury counsel (UK government lawyer) is seated beside the local prosecuting counsel, openly puppeteering him every step of the way.
So why has the UK government chosen Jersey to prosecute a local pacifist whose statements provide possibly the weakest case of support for terrorism that has ever been heard in any court in the Western world?
The answer is that here in Jersey there is no jury.
Facing this charge on the UK mainland Natalie would have a jury, and there is not a jury in the UK that would not throw this self-evidently vindictive nonsense out in 5 minutes.
Why is it worth the time and expense for Whitehall to send Alison Morgan KC here to direct a weak case against somebody who is obviously not a terrorist?
The plain answer is that this is a pilot for what they can get away with on the mainland when they abolish juries in such trials, as “Justice Secretary” David Lammy has announced that they will indeed do.
In Jersey the system is inherited from the Normans. The judge sits with two “jurats” or lay magistrates. They determine innocence or guilt. These come from a pool of 12 permanent jurats. In practice these are retired professionals and frequently have strong connections to the financial services industry.
What the jurats emphatically are not is Natalie Strecker’s working class peers of a kind who would be represented on a jury. I strongly recommend this brief article on the corruption of Jersey society by a man who was for 11 years the Government of Jersey’s economic adviser.
The judge, Sir John Saunders, seems a decent old stick in a headmasterly sort of way. He has told the court that “Mrs Strecker’s good character is not in doubt”. On Friday he stated that this was “A very difficult and in many ways a very sad case for the court to deal with. But I have to construe it according to strict legal principles”.
In the Palestine Action proscription case, as I reported, counsel for the UK government openly stated “We do not deny that the law is draconian. It is supposed to be”. In the mass arrests of decent people over Palestine Action, people have understood what a dreadfully authoritarian law the proscription regime is.
An intelligent observer cannot sit in Judge Saunders’ courtroom without realising that he thinks this is a dreadful law, but accepts that it is his job to enforce it. He reminds me of the caricature of the lugubrious headmaster stating “This is going to hurt me more than it is going to hurt you”.
In effect, Alison Morgan and the UK government are attempting through this prosecution to make even the most basic expression of support for Palestine a serious criminal offence. Remember that a terrorism conviction destroys your life – it almost certainly brings loss of employment, debanking and severe travel restrictions.
The International Court of Justice has decided that Israel has a real case to answer on Genocide, and most experts believe that Israel is committing Genocide. In Natalie’s correct image, the UK government is trying to make it a terrorist offence to say anything other than that the Palestinians should quietly submit to Genocide on their knees.
The danger is that the hubris of lay magistrates will lead the jurats to try cleverly to construe Natalie’s comments as support for terrorism in line with the government’s wishes. Natalie has, however, one defence in Jersey not available in mainland UK: here in Jersey the prosecution has to show intent – that she intended to cause support for terrorist organisations.
The prosecution has also relied on the extremely wide definition of support adopted in UK terrorist cases, that “support of” merely means “expression of agreement with”.
In defending the tweet about Hamas-run health ministry figures, Natalie Strecker’s counsel Mark Boothman countered this rather well when he said: “there is no offence of causing people to think less badly of Hamas”
I confess however I am slightly puzzled that I have not heard the defence argue that the prosecution positions are grossly disproportionate violations of freedom of expression in terms of Article X of the European Convention of Human Rights.
I would have thought, for example, that was the natural thing to say in response to the prosecution’s contention that it would be a crime for a law lecturer to tell his class that the Palestinian people had the right of armed resistance in international law.
The verdict was decided yesterday afternoon between the judge and jurats. It will be presented in full written judgment in an hour’s time.
This is a truly horrifying case for Natalie, who cannot afford to lose her job with a Jersey government agency and most certainly does not wish to be jailed. I pinch myself to be sure that this is all really happening.
It is a truly horrifying case in terms of what the Starmer government intends to do on the mainland in further criminalising support for Palestine.
I do not support Hamas nor Hezbollah, being opposed to theocracy. But for it to be illegal to discuss the Genocide in Gaza and the role of these two organisations, unless you do it absolutely without either context or nuance, is Orwellian.
Western dissent is also a victim of the Zionist Genocide.
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I wonder if there are not more people fined and in prison in the UK for objecting to the genocide in Gaza than there are people in Russia fined and in prison for using the word “war ” rather than “special military operation”.
Likely because those in Russia have been sent to the frontlines.
That is quite a slick reply, Kacper, but you will forgive me if I don’t just take your word for it and ask you if you have any fiable source(s) for what you say?
Kacper, I believe the proper official phrase is “highly likely”.
Which means “untrue”.
Look! Over there! A squirrel!
“Likely because those in Russia have been sent to the frontlines.”
Ukraine is not Russia yet, you are jumping the gun a bit.
The YooKay has multiple times the political dissidents that run afoul off the regime, both in relative & absolute numbers. Compared to Russia or perhaps even Chinese FFS!
Plus the Russian government doesn’t seem to care as much for petty day-to-day restraints & loicense nonsense…
The real question is why Russia should need such a law in the first place.
Actually the powers that be succumbed to reality in March 2024 and it’s now officially a war. This must be of great comfort to mothers who lost sons to know they died in a proper war and not some pointless military adventure.
At the time 5,800 people had been arrested for making this fundamental mistake and a further 20,000 for daring to speak out in opposition to the war overall. A further 7,800 had been charged with ‘discrediting the armed forces’, a ‘crime’ as open to interpretation as our own terrorism or online safety acts. Since February 2024 the Russian state has the power to strip anyone found guilty of all money and assets thus punishing spouses and children as well.
https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/08/1140147
Can’t find a total for the number of ‘Palestine Action’ supporters currently awaiting trial but I would hazard a guess it’s less than 2,000 and Section 13 of the Terrorism Act allows for a maximum sentence of six months rather than the seven years Russians face for daring to speak out.
This all sounds horrible, but the reality is quite different. The stats for such cases for the period from March to October 2022 that I found:
There were 3,406 cases in courts in total; in 2,538 cases the sentensing was a fine; 138 cases were thrown out of court and in 305 the prosecution erred in paperwork (source: New Izvestiya, Nov 1, 2022). It is not clear what the outcome of the remaining 425 cases was. However, here is a typical case. A resident of Surgut was found guilty for his actions of protesting the war and fined 40,000 rubles. He was standing near local shopping mall with a poster “War is not the solution. I am against the bloodshed” (source: muksun.fm Dec 21, 2023). So to get 7 years in prison one really has to do a lot.
“At the time 5,800 people had been arrested for making this fundamental mistake and a further 20,000 for daring to speak out in opposition to the war overall. A further 7,800 had been charged with ‘discrediting the armed forces’,”
Funny how the Russians know how to stop offending when the total reaches a nice round number. How can they tell?
I think, just possibly, the numbers might have been rounded.
Ahhh , Piers Morgaine says the figures were odd because they were just rounded up .
Pears
And perhaps another real question is why the UK should need a revised and tightened terrorism act in the first place?
Indeed.
Piers Morgaine , United Nations say this , but do you beleive it ? obviously you do but there are many within the United Nations who support the west against Russia and therefore this report may be balderdash .
Thank you Craig for an excellent report.
In late 2023 Lammy claimed on Sky News that Palestinians had “raped babies”. A crude and depraved attempt to justify Israel’s mass shredding of babies with RAF support.
That genocidal lie was seen by many thousands times as many people as Natalie Strecker’s tweets.
When Lammy was appointed Foreign Secretary the following year there was not a murmur of dissent from any corner of the British media commentariat.
Nor has it been suggested from that quarter that Lammy’s practical support of the Gaza Genocide while foreign secretary should have legal repercussions for him.
It is completely off the table so far as British journalists are concerned. The public must be made to believe he has committed no crimes.
Has the verdict been delivered?
Whilst I agree with you conceptually, what I am reading on the Beeb prior to the announced changes is that a jury trial will still always be available if the maximum sentence for the crime in question is more than 5 years. It would seem, therefore, that jury trials will remain available in England & Wales for offences under the Terrorism Act.
Have I misunderstood?
You were right but they’ve changed it to less than three years.
A report I read referred to the “likely sentence” rather than the “maximum sentence.”
I don’t know which is correct, but details like this can matter.
Thin end of the wedge as always with these freedom sapping changes.
They don’t need to ask for a sentence of more than five years to f*ck you up. They can apply hefty fines then jail you again for not being able to pay them. After you’ve been ruined & de-banked etc.
Plus overall, the punishment is the process in this decaying shithole.
You don’t really need to do any actual time at all – a suspended sentence for something fairly innocuous (maybe a case like Natalie’s) provides you with a criminal record.
That might be described in the popular press as “Walking away free” as if it’s of zero consequence.
But a criminal conviction carries for life, particularly if you want to do anything significant abroad.
” But a criminal conviction carries for life, particularly if you want to do anything significant abroad. ”
Trashes your credit rating, loads insurance premiums and bars you from some jobs and professions.
non-jury courts (i.e. the so-called Diplock courts) have been operating in Northern Ireland since the 1970s. The Judge is judge, jury and executioner. The conviction rate is much higher than in ordinary courts. The Diplock court resembles more a military court-martial rather than an open and transparent civilian court you would expect from a western democracy, such as the United Kingdom
https://eurofree3.wordpress.com/2014/05/30/diplock-courts/
Ben Madigan , there is a lot of unsavoury goings on in northern ireland
As someone whose ancestors fought foreign occupiers, sacrificing own lives, I’m open about my full support for every nation’s right to fight military occupation. Especially such a brutal occupation as one in Palestine.
However, whether Hamas is a genuine representative of the Palestinian struggle for independence, or whether they’re more of an armed group holding control of a territory, with little if any democratic mandate and representing mostly foreign interests, is up to an academic debate. Certainly, some of the public statements by Hamas political leaders are utterly appalling.
As always, it’s not black and white.
Hamas were elected, not recently because Israel refused to allow elections, and are popular both in Gaza and the West Bank. Israel’s recent attempt to unseat them by financing gangs, failed completely.
Don’t forget that Hamas have had a not insignificant amount of their funding facilitated by Netanyahu (something about which he has publicly boasted over the years)…
True, but as far as I can detect, the Netanyahu funding was back in the 2000s or around then, when he was trying to split Gaza from the West Bank, in order to divide the Palestinians. It doesn’t continue today, when Israel are funding gangs to contest Hamas’ hold on Gaza. The issue doesn’t say anything much about Hamas. long time ago.
Kacper
You suggest two possible identities (rôles if you will) for the group you mention. Let us leave aside academic debate – neither you nor I are academics, I suppose – and let me ask you which identity you believe is the case?
Hamas won the only democratic election in the history of the middle east.
Are not elections in Israel democratic? Some would say too democratic, in that provisions like in Germany and some other countries to the effect that a party has to get at least 5% of the popular vote to gain representation in parliament do not apply, with the result that there are myriad parties in the Knesset and small lunatic parties get into a position where they can, by leaving a coalition, cause the government to fall.
There is much good, solid argument on Mr Murray’s blog, but I do wish that some correspondents would not come out with absolute garbage – which simply plays into the hands of Zionists and their ilk.
(Apologies if I am wrong about the 5% provision not applying, but even if so, I do not think my stricture is voided)
Correction – have just found out that the electoral threshold is 3,35%. Pretty low.
No, Israeli elections are not democratic. One of the Israeli Palestinian parties would not be allowed to form or participate in government, if it won. They are excluded on ethnic grounds.
That is very disappointing to hear, Laguerre. Could you possibly source that for us?
I believe there are a couple of Arab Israeli parties in the Knesset, albeit with few MKs. So how and why would another Arab Israeli party be excluded on “ethnic grounds”?
And what do you mean by “won”? Do you mean “won any seats” or “won the election” in the sense of being the majority party
LCS
Well, Israeli apartheid is not written down, though the Knesset has declared Israel a Jewish state eternally. the matter came up in the tied elections of recent years. Arab parties could support the governing coalition but not have ministers in the government.
Thank you very much for your response, Laguerre. If I understand you properly, what you said in your post yesterday at 15:16 was a sort of unwritten arrangement?
I assume you don’t live in Israel or have personal contact with ministers, MKs, etc, so I also have to assume that you read about what you claim. Could you perhaps give us a source of two (written!)? If you’re unable or unwilling to do so, perhaps you’d indicate which of the “tied elections” in recent years the question came up at, so that I can try to do my own research? Many thanks.
LCS
No, I’ve known the region for fifty years and been directly engaged in its affairs, starting in Jordan. I’ve seen what happens.
I’d have to look up the tied elections, but it was when Netanyahu was out of power for a period, and Naftali Bennet was in.
No, zionazi elections are defined by apartheid. Elections under the Smith regime and under apartheid in South Africa weren’t democratic for the same reason.
Squeeth
I suppose you and perhaps some others might start thinking I’m posting in order to shill for Israel. Let me assure you that is not the case! But I do feel that nonsense and false claims should be challenged; not to do so gives the impression that Israel’s and Zionism’s opponents are just twisters.
Elections in Southern Rhodesia (as it was then called) and apartheid South Africa were certainly undemocratic, no question. That is because very large numbers of citizens were not given the vote. That, however, is not the case in Israel, where all citizens, whether Israeli Jews or Israeli Arabs (or indeed Israeli Christians), have the vote.
Now I’m sure there are all sorts of apartheid features (some legal, some just practice) present in Israel, but to call their elections undemocratic because of that is too much of a stretch.
LCS
“others might start thinking I’m posting in order to shill for Israel. Let me assure you that is not the case!”
Then why are you going to such lengths to try to break criticisms of the Israeli system. They don’t write things into the law in the way the South Africans did, because they don’t need to. They’re a community which hangs together and runs the show, excluding the Palestinian-Israelis from any access to power.
There’s plenty to read in the Israeli “sceptical” historians analysing how things were done – Ilan Pappé, avi Shlaim, etc.
Laguerre
Let me start by saying that I will get acquainted with the works of Avi Schlaim, Ilan Pappé and indeed others, thank you. I know that they are respected academics and enjoy great standing.
Now to your response(s).
If you’ll forgive me for saying so, I find your reply offensive and “Israeli-like”, in that you very subtly lead a third party into mistakenly believing something. You do that here by saying I, ie Luis Cunha da Silva, “repeatedly” (really?) go “to such lengths” (really?) to “break criticisms” (really?) of the Israeli system.
All that because I dare to question – mildly, I think – your characterization of Israeli elections as undemocratic and furthermore dare to ask you for sources to back up what you claim from experience?
After all, whereas Avi Schleim and Ilan Pappé have no need to present their credentials, I don’t know who you are from Adam. Therefore I do not feel obliged to refrain from questioning or even criticising what you write.
I note you did in fact end up by indicating written sources. You could have given those sources straight away and kept your temper. I hate to think what your reaction would have been had I asked you in a more muscular fashion!
Luis Cunha da Silva – you are right. Elections in Israel proper are reasonably democratic. They weren’t until 1966 when the Arab areas were under military occupation – and the Arab vote then went to Jewish religious parties!
But they are now, and some here don’t understand that is the frightening thing. That it makes it worse. It is not apologetics. The solid majority is brainwashed, believes a fictional history that blames Israel’s victims for Israel’s problems and is behind the genocide.
@ Calgacus
I agree. You put your finger on a very important point.
like what? what are some examples? I’m minded they redrafted their charter to avoid allegations of “antisemitism”. How do they compare to the appalling statements of Netanyahu et al (Amalek, Palestinians being animals and so on).
I believe Hamas was originally supported/created by the Israelis to undermine the PA. Unfortunately, for the genociders they appear to have gone off script by actually helping Palestinians and opposing Israel.
We’ll probably see a similar story soon in Syria.
You reap what you sow …
“…whether Hamas is a genuine representative of the Palestinian struggle for independence, or whether they’re more of an armed group holding control of a territory, with little if any democratic mandate and representing mostly foreign interests, is up to an academic debate.”
Well I guess it’s “up to an academic debate” as long as you don’t try to argue the case for the former, otherwise you’ll end up in jail.
How academic debate has changed since I was at Cambridge! In those days the worst that could happen was to be cancelled and unpersoned, as happened to that great historian David Irving.
Reminds me of that old joke…
Q. How do you know if someone went to Oxford or Cambridge?
A. Don’t worry. They’ll soon tell you.
I confess I did wonder whether I should name the university. Then I thought, “Why not? It’s not shameful”.
Maybe I was wrong about that. For what it’s worth, I crawled out with a II.1 in history, which was about as helpful as a used teabag. Except that I did spend three years studying the ways in which power is exploited.
No worries, you’re far from the worst offender as far as that sort of thing is concerned. It was nowhere near a humble-brag, either.
I rarely mention Scumbag Uni which I attended – now that actually is a shameful admission!
@ Tom Welsh
Looking at matters and your personal history frankly and honestly, do you feel that you owe any part of your subsequent success(es) in life (especially your career) to the fact that people, eg employers, knew you were a Cambridge graduate?
I ask because I get the impression that to be successful (at least in employment and social terms) in England and perhaps the Commonwealth you need to have either gone to a private school or to Oxford/Cambridge, or even better, to both.
LCdS, “…do you feel that you owe any part of your subsequent success(es) in life (especially your career) to the fact that people, eg employers, knew you were a Cambridge graduate?”
Hell no. I have been employed by only 3 companies since I graduated, and while they saw my CV none of them asked me anything about my degree. Actually, I got my first job because I was moderately fluent in French and the manager who interviewed me had two senior French computer engineers attending a training course in English a couple of months later. My first assignment was simultaneous translation.
@ Tom Welsh
All the best people get History 2:1s. ;O)
“I ask because I get the impression that to be successful (at least in employment and social terms) in England and perhaps the Commonwealth you need to have either gone to a private school or to Oxford/Cambridge, or even better, to both.”
It depends what your idea of “success” is. If it is a senior position in the Civil Service or the BBC, then probably yes. If it is managing a large concern in the construction industry or becoming a top athlete, then no, probably the opposite.
Bayard
Yes, I was certainly thinking of the BBC and civil service, but judging by the profiles one can read on Wikipedia and suchlike, I would also say in the media more generally, in politics as represented certainly by MPs, special advisors, etc, in think tanks and institutes and so so.
You are probably right when it comes to top athletes and large construction companies, although I do get the impression that quite a few of board members across large swathes of industry, banking and commerce generally have that sort of background (partly due to the fact that former civil servants and politicians use the revolving door).
As to my idea of success, I guess I mean getting into the top layers of the relevant hierarchy, to be one of the movers, shakers and deciders who boss round the poor bloody infantry…..
@ Tom Welsh
Is Daid Irving still alive? I’d love to get a copy of his book that caused so much trouble.
I tried to get a copy, recently, written by Winstanly, but was told it was unavailable at the moment.
I’m not sure about David Irving’s state of health or otherwise, although Wikipedia has not reported his death. To see his writings, I suggest Ron Unz’s Web site https://www.unz.com/book/, although there are such huge heaps of material there you may have to use the search option. You can also try https://irvingcollection.org/
You can’t have looked very hard. Most of his books are available from irvingbooks.com .
David Irving didn’t get into trouble about a book he wrote, if that is what you were thinking. He got into trouble I think because he sued an American Jewish university professor (Deborah Lipstadt) for libel for calling him a holocaust denier or something similar. He lost the case.
Didn’t Oscar Wilde also get into trouble for suing Lord Someone or another?
Kacper , put your feet in their shoes walk the walk talk the talk think about what you would say if your people had been treated the way these people have for decades
It appears that she has been found not guilty.
https://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2025/12/02/breaking-pro-palestine-activist-not-guilty-of-inviting-support-for-terror-groups/
https://www.bailiwickexpress.com/news/breaking-palestine-activist-cleared-of-terrorism-charges
What a relief. This was worrying. On the mainland, hopefully juries will act justly to defend traditional civil liberties.
That is, while they can. The Home Secretary is planning to abolish juries for trials with likely sentences under three years.
I would be interested to know where the Green and Your Parties stand on the question of jury trials. Did the Liverpool conference indicate anything?
All political parties are political parties. They will never bring about change.
To put it a little more exactly, all political parties are corporations. Just like business corporations – which indeed they are – their behaviour closely resembles that of Terminators. They have no scruples, no principles, no emotions, no better nature, and they are wholly dedicated to a single objective: winning power (and the money that comes with it).
“To put it a little more exactly, all political parties are corporations…”
To be even more accurate all political parties and corporations are large human organisations, and over time, all large human organisations will tend towards a mode where the internal interests of the organisation overwhelm its avowed purpose. The Catholic Church and any Western political party are good examples. You could say self-interest is the avowed purpose of any large corporation, but that misses the point. It wasn’t the avowed purpose of Boeing to build aircraft that would crash and kill hundreds of people, but that’s what they ended up doing.
3 years in prison at the discretion of a magistrate or judge? sounds like fascism to me
“It is fascism, sir.” (to paraphrase Catch-22)
“The Home Secretary is planning to abolish juries for trials with likely sentences under three years.”
I guess that a lot of crimes will soon fall into that category.
Do we get sent to he gulag for being pleased about the outcome?
Jersey Post on-line reports NOT Guilty !
Hooray, smiley faces allround.
«Judge John Saunders interrupted the prosecution to ask whether they were saying that he would be guilty of support for terrorism if, in a lecture, he told an international law class that Palestinians have the right to armed resistance in international law. […] the prosecution replied that yes, it could be the offence to tell law students that. […] the Palestinians are beyond doubt an occupied people in international law, and equally beyond doubt an occupied people have the right of armed resistance.»
One side claims that no armed resistance is legitimate, the other side claims that any and every murder or massacre of those they regard as evil is legitimate.
What to me it seems deeply intellectual dishonest from both sides is to omit that the right of “armed resistance” exists but is not “by any means”:
* Armed resistance by “franc tireurs”/”disguised combatants” is indeed considered the war crime of perfidy in international law. A civilian taking out a hidden gun and shooting an occupying force soldier is a murderer or a terrorist. A civilian wearing an explosive belt under their jacket and blowing up a bar full of people or a military checkpoint is not doing armed resistance but a war crime.
* Armed resistance is only legitimate if it is performed by a military force organized in a chain of command by people wearing distinctive signs and bearing arms openly and operating according to the conventions of war (including no attacks against civilians, using them as as shields, using them as hostages). Usually palestinian arab fighters do not wear distinctive signs and do not bear arms openly and therefore commit the war crime of perfidy.
The rule that the “armed resistance” of “franc tireurs”/”disguised combatants” is the war crime of perfidy is very important to protect civilian populations (and it is already a disgrace as to that the right of reprisals for that had been retroactively and unilaterally abolished by the Allies after WW2).
Regardless the UK government have legislated with huge popular support (or difference which practically has the same effect) that HAMAS and Hezbollah are terrorist organizations and speaking favorably of them is a crime, whether right or wrong. Therefore “The nail that stands out will get hammered” is a consolidated political principle in “liberal democracies” that are based on “guardrails”. Nothing new as to that, here is a quote from from 93 years ago:
https://books.google.ca/books?id=jJj0NgA08SUC&pg=PA244&lpg=PA244
George Orwell “Review of The Civilization of France by Ernst Robert Curtius” (1932)
“In England, a century of strong government has developed what O. Henry called the stern and rugged fear of the police to a point where any public protest seems an indecency. […] The highly socialised modern mind, which makes a kind of composite god out of the rich, the government, the police and the larger newspapers, has not been developed – at least not yet.”
“Both sides are wrong ..”, after a century of ceaseless colonial dispossession, genocide, sadistic humiliation, apartheid, rape, etc.
Pro-zionist special pleading.
Journalist: M. Ben M’Hidi, don’t you think it’s a bit cowardly to use women’s baskets and handbags to carry explosive devices that kill so many innocent people?
Ben M’Hidi: And doesn’t it seem to you even more cowardly to drop napalm bombs on defenseless villages, so that there are a thousand times more innocent victims? Of course, if we had your airplanes it would be a lot easier for us. Give us your bombers, and you can have our baskets.
«Of course, if we had your airplanes it would be a lot easier for us. Give us your bombers, and you can have our baskets.»
The right of reprisal was abolished by the Allies (retroactively) after WW2 and committing or advocating reprisals is a war crime as much as committing the war crime that causes the reprisal.
If the palestinian jews were horrified after the hostage taking they should have merely petitioned for an intervention to the UN Security Council instead of making a reprisal on the whole of Gaza, and if the palestinian arabs were horrified after decades of violent occupation they should have done the same instead of taking civilian hostages.
This may sound unacceptable to both sides, but such is international law and people who make appeal to international law must respect its obligations too; international law does not give an exemption from international law to any group.
International law, what’s that then ? An oppressors charter ?
Keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result, after 77 years it’s fairly obvious that international law is a joke.
«Keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result, after 77 years it’s fairly obvious that international law is a joke.»
That is honest and non-hypocritical position; I am just making the point that international laws is what it is, and that claiming to have rights but no obligations under international law is just hypocrisy.
«International law, what’s that then ? An oppressors charter ?»
It is designed to minimize civilian losses in war: the overall logic of international law is that the only legitimate conflicts are those between governments (and quasi-governments like liberation movements) and should only target the military forces of those governments and avoid the civilians if possible.
The illegality of “franc tireurs”/”disguised combatants” has the same motivation: soldier are not saints and tend to be pretty brutalized by war, and if every civilian-looking person is free to pull out a gun and start shooting at them in the back then they will take matters in their hands and shoot first every civilian that gets near them, right or wrong.
The same applies to the right of decimation: it used to be (until it was retroactively canceled by the Allies after WW2) a widely recognized right of military forces that if the civilian population of an area were not cooperating with the occupiers in finding “franc tireurs”/”disguised combatants” the military occupiers had the right to gather a group of civilians at random to execute them as a form of collective punishment to encourage the rest.
This was also legal to protect the civilian populations to prevent even worse reprisals by soldiers terrified of being shot in the back by any civilian or their accomplices.
Note that international law for the same good reason does not make any difference between legitimate or illegitimate occupiers, or between “evil” and “good” occupiers.
What Palestinian Jews?
“Armed resistance by “franc tireurs”/”disguised combatants” is indeed considered the war crime of perfidy in international law. A civilian taking out a hidden gun and shooting an occupying force soldier is a murderer or a terrorist”.
That may well be so; but by that standard all the resistance fighters of WW2 were criminals and terrorists, not legitimate fighters. Indeed the German authorities designated the French Resistance, for example, as a terrorist organisation.
«by that standard all the resistance fighters of WW2 were criminals and terrorists, not legitimate fighters.»
Indeed many of them were terrorists but not all of them; many did organize themselves in military formations, with a chain of command, bearing distinctive signs, openly carrying arms and respecting the laws of war, and fought the enemy as soldiers, without “perfidy”.
Again many people do not understand that the convention against “disguised combatant” exists for the sake of protecting civilian populations, however often it is violated.
Apparently Churchill himself encouraged violations of the conventions of war in order to provoke reprisals from the german side (which were legal at the time) and then denounce them before USA public opinion too. This is also what the leaderships of both palestinian jews and palestinian arabs are doing for the same reason.
Many war criminal resistance fighters were not prosecuted after WW2 because their side won: while the difference between a legitimate soldier and a war criminal “disguised combatant” is clear in international law and usually easy to establish, the difference between “freedom fighters” and “terrorists” is just a matter of propaganda and of who wins.
“many did organize themselves in military formations, with a chain of command, bearing distinctive signs, openly carrying arms and respecting the laws of war, and fought the enemy as soldiers, without “perfidy”.”
Apart from, e.g. the Poles and the French fighting alongside the Allied forces, can you give me an example of these?
Since their governments had formally surrendered, I don’t think details like uniforms or organisation make much difference. Of course none of that matters if your side wins. Nor, in a sense, if your side loses.
Of course, if you are fighting a truly corrupt evil enemy it is not going to advance your cause if you play by their rules. Like gambling, the house always wins.
Everyone’s enemy is always described as truly corrupt and evil.
and sometimes they truly are
“What to me it seems deeply intellectual dishonest from both sides is to omit that the right of “armed resistance” exists but is not “by any means”:
Why is it dishonest? If you are denying the right of armed resistance full stop, then you are denying the right of armed resistance in special cases as well. Similarly, if any mention of the right of Palestinians to employ armed resistance can be construed as expressing support for a proscribed organisation, then it matters not whether those making that resistance are fulfilling the conditions under which they enjoy the protection of the law or not. It is a matter of rights under the law, not of methodology.
” A civilian taking out a hidden gun and shooting an occupying force soldier is a murderer or a terrorist.”
Not necessarily. There is a huge difference between a peaceful situation, when the soldier is walking down an otherwise peaceful street, or sitting at a cafe drinking coffee and when the soldier is advancing with other solders, weapon at the ready, in battle formation Are you saying that an armed civilian in the latter situation should just allow themselves to be shot dead?
“* Armed resistance is only legitimate if it is performed by a military force organized in a chain of command by people wearing distinctive signs and bearing arms openly and operating according to the conventions of war (including no attacks against civilians, using them as as shields, using them as hostages). ”
How about armed resistance against a military force not operating according to the conventions of war (including making attacks against civilians, using them as as shields, using them as hostages)? How does that work out?
“A civilian taking out a hidden gun and shooting an occupying force soldier is a murderer or a terrorist”
I don’t know who or what you’re quoting from, but this seems to me to be nonsense.
If a foreign government invades my country and stations its armed soldiers where I can safely get at them, I’m going to kill as many of them as I can in whatever underhand way I can, with as little risk as possible to myself. Any government which doesn’t like that can avoid the situation by not invading my country.
That’s all very well, Townsman, but the debate was more about the legal standing of such fighters. If one is defending one’s country against invasion after the legitimate government has formally surrendered, it’s hard to claim legitimacy.
My mother told me, some time in the 1970s I suppose, that if the Germans had invaded Britain she would have taken a rifle into the Scottish Highlands – her home – and would have died content if she had first managed to kill even a single German soldier.
But that was legitimate if the British government had not surrendered, as Churchill vowed it wouldn’t. If it had surrendered, presumably it would have been the duty of British citizens to comply.
The case of Palestinians is different, in that they have never had a government that was recognised as legitimate by the great powers of the world. Not having a government to organise resistance, it seems reasonable to argue that citizens themselves should be allowed to do so. (And the alternative would be for them to allow themselves to be murdered without resisting).
I suspect that telling the judge that he himself could be imprisoned for telling the truth, while “courageous”, was unwise.
https://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2025/12/02/breaking-pro-palestine-activist-not-guilty-of-inviting-support-for-terror-groups/
Not guilty Verdict. I see this all stemed from a complaint from a member of the public. They seem very selective on which complaints they follow up in the establishment eh?
I understand that certain very wealthy organisations maintain unblinking vigilance, continually on the lookout for the slightest grounds for complaint. For those who can afford it, such a policy is sure to pay off; after a few successful prosecutions, free speech is significantly discouraged.
Even unsuccessful prosecutions “send a message”, as the cant phrase is. Money talks; but it is also very effective at preventing others from talking.
According to the BBC, she was cleared of the charges because “jurats concluded Mrs Strecker did not have the specific intent to invite support, leading to a verdict of not guilty on both charges.”
So, as Craig sadly says, this is a defence not available in the mainland UK, where proving intent is not required, so a similar case here can lead to conviction if no jury is present. The UK government seems to have succesfully passed this test, although thankfully Natalie Strecker will go home free.
UN Resolution 37/43 also refers to several earlier resolutions, notably 3103 of December 1973, which explicitly states inter alia:
1. The struggle of peoples under colonial and alien domination and racist regimes for the implementation of their right to self-determination and independence is legitimate and in full accordance with the principles of international law.
2. Any attempt to suppress the struggle against colonial and alien domination and racist regimes is incompatible with the Charter of the United Nations, the Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples and constitutes a threat to international peace and security.
3. The armed conflicts involving the struggle of peoples against colonial and alien domination and racist regimes are to be regarded as international armed conflicts in the sense of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and the legal status envisaged to apply to the combatants in the 1949 Geneva Conventions and other international instruments is to apply to the persons engaged in armed struggle against colonial and alien domination and racist regimes
«the legal status envisaged to apply to the combatants in the 1949 Geneva Conventions and other international instruments is to apply to the persons engaged in armed struggle against colonial and alien domination and racist regimes»
The recognition of that legal status necessarily includes also the obligation to respect the international laws and conventions of war including to avoid targeting civilians, not taking civilians as hostages, and operating as a military force with chain of command, distinctive signs and open bearing of arms.
Not that it matters: even if the legal distinction between soldiers and “disguised combatants” is pretty clear in international law and conventions, the distinction between “freedom fighters” and “terrorists” depends solely on propaganda.
https://blissex.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/poliusadonatethecontras-1985.png
https://blissex.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/poliusadonatemujaheddin-1981.png
“avoid targeting civilians” The hypocrisy is very apparent when you consider: Guernica, Coventry, Bremen, Dresden, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq, etc. No avoidance in any of these cases, and medals all around for the boys.
International law doesn’t apply to those defined as the baddies regardless of whether they wear uniforms or not.
OTOH, Without an agreed way of enforcing ‘international law’ it is just hot air and mountains of paper.
“OTOH, Without an agreed way of enforcing ‘international law’ it is just hot air and mountains of paper.”
That’s because it’s “international” law not “supranational”, i.e. law agreed between nations, not imposed on them from above. Anything agreed between two parties can be disagreed at the drop of a hat. Until there is supranational law and a supranational organisation to enforce it, international law will simply be a stick for larger nations to beat smaller nations with.
And once there is supranational law and a supranational organisation to enforce it, the ultimate tyranny will have begun and no one will be able to resist it.
You can’t mend human nature by fiddling around with bits of paper. Or even armies.
“While our country remains untainted with the principles and manners which are now producing desolation in so many parts of the world; while she continues sincere, and incapable of insidious and impious policy, we shall have the strongest reason to rejoice in the local destination assigned us by Providence. But should the people of America once become capable of that deep simulation towards one another, and towards foreign nations, which assumes the language of justice and moderation, while it is practising iniquity and extravagance, and displays in the most captivating manner the charming pictures of candour, frankness, and sincerity, while it is rioting in rapine and insolence, this country will be the most miserable habitation in the world. Because we have no government, armed with power, capable of contending with human passions, unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge and licentiousness would break the strongest cords of our Constitution, as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. Oaths in this country are as yet universally considered as sacred obligations. That which you have taken, and so solemnly repeated on that venerable ground, is an ample pledge of your sincerity and devotion to your country and its government”.
– John Adams, Letter to the Officers of the First Brigade of the Third Division of the Militia of Massachusetts, 11 October 1798, in Revolutionary Services and Civil Life of General William Hull (New York, 1848), pp 265-6. There are some differences in the version that appeared in The Works of John Adams (Boston, 1854), vol. 9, pp. 228-9, most notably the words “or gallantry” instead of “and licentiousness”.
“And once there is supranational law and a supranational organisation to enforce it, the ultimate tyranny will have begun and no one will be able to resist it.”
Indeed, “international law” doesn’t work, as it lacks an enforcement mechanism and supranational law, which would work, is not something that anyone who wasn’t one of the enforcers would want to have, which brings us back to the Melian dialogue as the only effective basis of international relations. In fact, I would suggest that it forms one of the two rules of the “rules based order” of which we have heard so much, the other being the Golden Rule: they that have the gold make the rules.
«What to me it seems deeply intellectual dishonest from both sides»
There is a similar political rather than a legal point: the leaders of both the palestinian jews and the palestinian arabs accuse only the other side of committing atrocities but both seem to me equally committed to committing atrocities to create endless resentment in both sides to prevent any compromise based on splitting the land because:
* The palestinian jews have military and political superiority and a vast arsenal of nuclear weapons so I guess they reckon that can take the whole of the land and I guess are fully prepared to make that part of west Asia a radioactive desert rather than surrender it.
* The palestinian arabs seem to me to wishfully think that in 100, 200, 300 years the palestinian jews will tire of their situation and leave or will be defeated by a stronger empire that then will gift to the palestinian arabs all of the land (even if that land had been conquered by many empires and none of them ever gifted it to the palestinian arabs; the main road in Gaza is delusionaly named after Saladdin).
* The leader of both sides seem to me to realize that their current power rests on a constant state of conflict and peace would change the politics of their sides most likely to their detriment.
* The great powers that are afraid of the possible resurgence of the persian, arab, turkish empires I guess think they benefit from lack of compromise as it keeps the whole west Asia destabilized.
“both the palestinian jews and the palestinian arabs accuse only the other side of committing atrocities but both seem to me equally committed to committing atrocities to create endless resentment”
This is quite wrong. Israel has deliberately, since before the 1948 war, undertaken a policy of permanent hostility with its neighbours, never changed. The first massacres of Palestinians were undertaken before the declaration of independence, including Deir Yassin. The only condition of so-called peace is absolute submission, mediated by the US. And even then there’s no guarantee they won’t bomb the country concerned, as in the case of Doha.
You know well that this can’t last, and it is not lasting, in spite of your claims that the Arabs are delusional. What western Israeli wants to spend his whole life at war? Only the religious nutters. Any ordinary intelligent Israeli Jew wants a peaceful life, but that is not the policy of the government, has never been. So they’re moving out. Buying property in Cyprus at the moment, but that won’t last either.
It’s precisely the same problem that lost the Crusaders the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The religious orders were the only ones who stayed. So there were not enough to defend the Kingdom against Saladin.
«Israel has deliberately, since before the 1948 war, undertaken a policy of permanent hostility with its neighbours, never changed. The first massacres of Palestinians were undertaken before the declaration of independence, including Deir Yassin.»
Not just of palestinians, of english people too (Irgun, Menachem Begin).
But it does not matter who started it at this point, because the leaderships of both sides seem now to have a policy of making atrocities. Another commenter posted above a declaration by an algerian “freedom fighter” as example of another leadership committed to making atrocities:
“Journalist: M. Ben M’Hidi, […] use women’s baskets and handbags to carry explosive devices that kill so many innocent people?
Ben M’Hidi: […] Of course, if we had your airplanes it would be a lot easier for us. Give us your bombers, and you can have our baskets.”
“The only condition of so-called peace is absolute submission, mediated by the US.”
That is called the roman empire status of being “dedicitiis” for enemies that accept defeat; the options for the palestinian arabs are:
* Accept defeat and the status of “dedicitiis” like the germans and the japanese and the italians and their allies accepted after WW2, of the local xhosa etc. accepted after the bantus defeated them and settled in southern Africa etc.
* Do not accept defeat and continue fighting for independence using military-style formations as for example the the communists did in China against the japanese.
* Do not accept defeat and commit war crimes as illegal reprisals against the war crimes of the other side to keep both sides away from a compromise.
“But it does not matter who started it at this point, because the leaderships of both sides seem now to have a policy of making atrocities.”
No, that’s what you want to think. I’m pretty sure that the Palestinians would accept a reasonable offer of equality in a single, democratic state. But that is not on offer. Only permanent militarised domination. They have no choice but to fight. The Iron Wall has been the Israeli philosophy since the time of Herzl. The Arabs are only reacting to that aggressivity.
«I’m pretty sure that the Palestinians would accept a reasonable offer of equality in a single, democratic state.»
Why are palestinian arab leaderships then organizing and committing so many atrocities (only their scale is smaller than that of the palestinian jews) that keep that possibility every further away? Why is the main road of Gaza named after Saladdin and not after Mandela? :-). Let us not be so wistfully optimistic: after so many atrocities both sides have so many “martyrs” that a large minority (and probably a majority) of both would fight any equality between them.
«But that is not on offer.»
It is also international law that the land is partitioned and the palestinian jews have a right to their own state, separate from that of the palestinian arabs, and those who appeal to international law should not do so selectively.
«Only permanent militarised domination.»
That is what happens to the defeated. Most of Europe and Japan accepted their defeat in WW2 and its consequences.
«They have no choice but to fight»
But even if it were so they still have the choice to not commit atrocities; but to me it seems that the leaderships of both sides are not interested in the choice of not committing atrocities.
blissex
“Why are palestinian arab leaderships then organizing and committing so many atrocities”
Um, what atrocities? you’re talking about the Israeli inventions of events ascribed to October 7th, not real events.
“both sides seem now to have a policy of making atrocities.”
That doesn’t quite stand up. One obvious stark example is the difference between returned Israeli hostages and Hamas hostages. Who are the barbarians ?
Oh but it does matter who “started it” because here the whole question of land ownership lies. It’s not that there were 2 pre-existing adversaries, like kids in a playground spat. European invaders came and bought up but then appropriated (stole) on a far greater scale land in Palestine.
Exactly so, Nick. That’s just it.
There were “Palestinian Jews” for centuries – no doubt millennia – and they lived almost entirely at peace with their compatriots of all races and religions. As people did in Syria and Lebanon until the Europeans started to stir up wars there too.
The Israelis are almost all foreigners from Europe, America, Russia, and elsewhere who descended on Palestine after 1900 and especially after WW2. Following the plans of Herzl and others, they fully intended to take over the whole of Palestine (and, if possible, the whole region) as a strictly Jewish nation. No Gentile of any kind was to be allowed citizenship, although some might be tolerated as menial workers. (Note that such a policy would not be tolerated in any other nation whatever. “Britain for the British”? Imagine the howling and the prosecutions).
Everything has followed with perfect logic. The Zionists want an “Israel” cleansed – scrubbed entirely clean – of any and all Gentiles. That includes the historic Palestinians, many of whom may have more Jewish genes than most Israelis.
My favourite cartoon on the subject shows two men angrily shoving their faces at one another and yelling. The one on the left, wearing a kippah, is saying “You’re anti-semitic!” The one on the right, in traditional Palestinian dress, is replying, “I *AM* a Semite! You’re just a random white guy from Arizona”.
“Natalie has however one defence in Jersey not available in mainland UK – here in Jersey the prosecution has to show intent: that she intended to cause support for terrorist organisations.”
“…up to ten years in jail in Jersey, or 14 years in jail on the UK mainland”
How did these differences come about?
Probably because Jersey can make its own laws, Grhm.
Could Natalie Strecker – not have asked for case to be moved to a court on the mainland – where she could’ve had a jury trial.
“December 3, 1982. At that time UNGA resolution 37/43 removed any doubt or debate over the lawful entitlement of occupied people to resist occupying forces by any and all lawful means. The resolution reaffirmed “the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial and foreign domination and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle”
Hamas and other armed groups do have the right of armed resistance under UN resolution 3246, here is United Nations resolution 3246 November 29th [1974]
“Affirms the legitimacy of armed resistance by oppressed peoples in pursuit of the right to self determination, and condemns governments which do not support that right”. https://www.bing.com/search?q=un+resolution+3246&qs=UT&pq=un+resolution+3246&sc=10-18&cvid=805EDE18BF124A4E8DCD1C7AA6C17D1F&FORM=QBRE&sp=1&ghc=1&lq=0
The PM should be called ‘two tier-Keir’ after reading this episode from a court case in 2003 when Starmer was a so called Human rights Lawyer (no, don’t laugh).
“It has now emerged that the Prime Minister represented a defendant in a similar case in 2003. A group of anti-war protesters had broken into RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire to sabotage US bombers before they flew to Iraq.
Sir Keir argued that while the actions were against the law, they were justified because they were trying to stop the planes from committing war crimes. Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, tweeted: “Worth noting that Keir Starmer defended an activist who broke into an RAF base to set fire to aircraft. Starmer claimed his client was legally justified because it might stop a war crime. Sir Keir argued in court that Mr Richards believed any force he used was reasonable in an attempt to stop alleged war crimes.” https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/06/20/starmer-defended-protester-who-sabotaged-military-aircraft/
“The prosecution has also relied on the extremely wide definition of support adopted in UK terrorist cases, that “support of” merely means “expression of agreement with”.
Could the prosecution make a case to the effect that ‘agreement’ with the UN resolution in my above comment, in the context of Israel/Palestine, could be construed as support for a proscribed group? Or would I need to qualify my support for the resolution by condemning Hamas and Hezbollah, or any armed group in OPT now recognized as a legitimate state recently by HMG. In other words it is a contradiction. Crazy isn’t it?
Perhaps it should be agreed that the US and UK governments are by far the most egregious and worst terrorist organisations ever, and that all this nonsense about “terrorism” should be applied to them in spades.
Compared to those governments, the “terrorist” efforts of individuals and non-government organisations are just “noise”. Since 1945 the US government alone has murdered at least 12 million people – mostly innocent, inoffensive civilians, who are the easiest targets. While the UK government lags far behind, that is more because of lack of means than lack of ambition.
“The PM should be called ‘two tier-Keir’ after reading this episode from a court case in 2003 when Starmer was a so called Human rights Lawyer (no, don’t laugh)”.
To make Mr Law’s point unmistakably plain – if it wasn’t already, which it was – may one ask whether Sir Keir’s words would today warrant his arrest, conviction, and imprisonment?
Never mind “human rights” lawyer, he’s a mediocre at best lawyer in general. His performance during the famous McLibel trial in the 1990’s wasn’t exactly great. In a very winnable case with two highly sympathetic underdog clients Vs the very stereotype of an evil, lying, US corporation using lawfare to punish critics.
So he’s not really qualified for any legal posts he he’d held in government. He only got those because he’s an unthinking, dour, spooked up cretin of a man. Who’d do what he’s ordered to do.
“A group of anti-war protesters (the Fairford 5) had broken into RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire to sabotage US bombers before they flew to Iraq”.
“Sir Keir argued that while the actions were against the law, they were justified because they were trying to stop the planes from committing war crimes”.
The Support Palestine Action group are doing exactly the same thing as the Fairford 5, in the latter’s case the protesters had the stopping of war crimes as their aim, whereas support Palestine Action has the aim of stopping Genocide, which the UN, Genocide scholars, NGO’s all over the world and the ICJ have said as an interim finding that there is indeed a plausible case of Genocide. Then of course there are the eyes of the vast majority of humans on earth, fed a diet of dead Palestinian children over the past 2 plus years, and Gaza reduced to a waste land. No Jury would convict, no Judge sitting alone [or three] could convict or if they did their names would live in infamy.
When all things are taken into account no jury could find them guilty, Starmer knows this, but he is such a hypocrite
The acquital of Mrs Strecker is to be welcomed but this whole affair, as described by Craig and his sources, raises a number of questions. In no particular order:
1. Is it necessary to send several armed police at 7 am to arrest a 50 year old woman about whom there was no justified suspicion that she would use violence to resist arrest or be armed, etc? If one were so inclined, one could say think this method of operation was intended, by the state, to terrorize her (and by extension, other pro-Palestine activists).
2. In cases and outcomes like this one, is there, in English law, the possibility of Mrs Strecker suing the police – or better still, the Home Office, for wrongful or malicious arrest?
3. One of the correspondents on this thread cites a report or statement which says that the origin of the arrest and charges was a complaint from a private individual. Would it be unduly suspicious if one were to surmise that the complainant was a Zionist and indeed linked to some UK based Zionist organization? Are there any legal means of finding out?
4. Strecker is not a Jersey or even particularly British surname. Would one be unduly suspicious if one were to think that she is Jewish and that she was targeted exactly for that reason (the argument being that Zionist particularly abhor pro-Palestinian activists who are themseves Jewish, thus making the “anti-semitism” charge particularly absurd?
5. Why is the “intent” provision in Jersey law and not in UK mainland law?
6. Had Mrs Strecker lost the case, is this the sort of case which would be appealable before the European Court of Human Rights?
7. Are correspondents of this thread aware of any serious studies available which have compared the terrorist legislation applicable in different European countries? It would be interesting to see if the UK is an outlier as regards the breadth of its provisions (and the severity of the potential penalties).
“Strecker is not a Jersey or even particularly British surname.”
It is now.
Thank you for that clarification, Squeeth. Any useful thoughts or info on my points 5, 6 and 7?
Go back to school.
Thank you, Squeeth – I shall take your advice.
“Strecker is not a Jersey or even particularly British surname.”
Er, she’s Mrs Strecker, so it’s odds on that that is not her maiden name and therefore it doesn’t matter whether the Streckers are Jews or not.
I believe the Israel lobby bears down especially hard on pro-Palestine activists who are themselves Jewish. As evidence by them being called “self-hating Jews”. That was obviously my point, so I’m not sure if you’re disputing it?
I’m pointing out that her surname is of no help in determining whether she is Jewish or not.
I do think the question of whether this pro-Paestinian activist is Jewish or not is important, given the particular circumstances of the case.
Surely you do not disagree that Zionists go after such people with particular venom?
Strecker Surname
AI yields the following:
Strecker Surname Meaning
German: from an agent derivative of Middle High German strecken ‘to stretch’ hence perhaps an occupational name for someone who stretched cloth out on tenterhooks. Alternatively, an occupational name for a torturer or executioner.
From an agent derivative of Middle Low German strecken ‘to plow (a piece of land) for the first time’ hence a nickname for someone who owned or worked a plot of land that had been newly taken into cultivation.
Possibly a habitational name for someone from Streckau near Zeitz in eastern Germany.
The US designates Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his government allies as members of a foreign terrorist organization.
This in effect gives Trump the power to ‘take them out’ similar to the way they have killed over 80 “Terrorists” on the open seas. ‘Kill em all’ orders Hegseth, the ex Fox news loon and now US Defence Sec. How soon will we all be designated supporters of proscribed groups under section 12 and 13 of the terrorism act like Natalie Strecker, or exterminated by gunshot or missile at the behest of Trump or Starmer?
“The US designates Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his government allies as members of a foreign terrorist organization”.
Pot, meet kettle.
Except that Mr Maduro is not a drug dealer or terrorist. Whereas the US government and its members are.
I really don’t know why people are shocked or surprised by this kind of thing. Once you accept the concept that words are violence, that there is such a thing as “hate speech”, it was always going to end up with these things happening to nice, liberal people. The Terrorism Act is just one aspect of this entire political philosophy, and it’s only going to crush tighter in the future. Either you put things back the way they were — say what you like to who you like about whatever you like short of direct incitement to immediate, identifiable violence — or you end up with prisons full of middle-class people who thought these things could only happen to the scruffs and the types who left school at sixteen.
Absolutely right, Athanasius! Freedom of speech is the fundamental liberty; once that is attacked, all the rest follows quickly. Freedom of speech, like virginity, is indivisible and must be sacred in any free society.
“Where there is much desire to learn, there of necessity will be much arguing, much writing, many opinions; for opinion in good men is but knowledge in the making…
“And though all the winds of doctrine were let loose upon the earth, so truth be in the field we do injuriously by licensing and prohibiting to misdoubt her strength. Let her and falsehood grapple; who ever knew truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter…”
– John Milton, “Areopagitica” (1644)
“Without free speech no search for Truth is possible; without free speech no discovery of Truth is useful; without free speech progress is checked, and the nations no longer march forward towards the nobler life which the future holds for man. Better a thousandfold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech. The abuse dies in a day; the denial slays the life of the people and entombs the hope of the race”.
– Attributed to Charles Bradlaugh, Speech at Hall of Science c.1880 quoted in An Autobiography of Annie Besant; reported in Edmund Fuller, Thesaurus of Quotations (1941), p. 398; reported as unverified in Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1989).
Sir Keir and his accomplices wouldn’t recognise freedom if they found it in their soup. But they do have Big Brother and O’Brien on their side.
When I was a young child at school, one of the many things I learned was that “Sticks and stones may break my bones; but words can never hurt me”.
That is a good rule for men. I cannot speak for women, many of whom seem to disagree. But then, women have always been notorious for gaining power by manipulating words.
My mother taught me the same phrase and I have lived by it. It would save a great deal of legislation if all laws criminalising speech introduced over the last 30 years were to be abolished and all children and adults are taught this straightforward wisdom.
Re: ‘I am slightly puzzled that I have not heard the defence argue that the prosecution positions are grossly disproportionate violations of freedom of expression in terms of Article X of the European Convention of Human Rights.’
Maybe because the Bailiwick of Jersey is not a member of the Council of Europe, therefore the ECHR does not apply. Whilst some leave a lot to be desired, lawyers do this law thing for a living, and in this case managed to get their client acquitted, so well done to them.
Natalie is innocent, and the court has found her to be! Let us hope the challenge to the proscription of Palestine Action fares as well.
We have been witnessing a runaway avalanche of wicked nonsense. Obviously a government is capable of making laws that are morally wrong, factually absurd, counterproductive in practice, and utterly unjustifiable.
First the West invaded other people’s countries to steal their resources. Anyone who resisted was killed, imprisoned, raped, or otherwise brutalised. All strictly according to the principles expressed by the Athenian herald in the Melian Dialogue (416 BC):
“…you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must…
“Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary law of their nature they rule wherever they can. And it is not as if we were the first to make this law, or to act upon it when made: we found it existing before us, and shall leave it to exist forever after us; all we do is to make use of it, knowing that you and everybody else, having the same power as we have, would do the same as we do”.
Cicero was more succinct: “Silent enim leges inter arma”. (“For laws are silent in times of war”).
The Western nations, or more exactly their governments, secret agencies, and armed forces, are always at war; and therefore their laws are always silent. Presumably the laws are maintained for the sake of appearances.
After foreigners have been invaded, murdered, tortured, raped, beaten up, imprisoned, rendered homeless, and robbed for long enough, a few of the bravest have a way of fighting back. This our governments call “terrorism”, and hasten to portray those who fight back as the villains of the piece.
All the laws and regulations pertaining to “terrorism” could and should be repealed, as they do far more harm than good. And if certain governments did not behave as if laws and treaties – even the UN Charter – did not apply to them, there would be little or no “terrorism”.
The UK and Germany are slowly waking up to the new power in the world, China, and are positioning themselves to take advantage. The US does not realize yet the unipolar world is breaking down, hopefully a genuine multipolar world will come back. Will China backed by BRICS use its power the same way as the US? We shall see, but they could not be worse.
Starmer thinks the UK getting closer to China could gain significantly from improved trading, especially in financial services, pharmaceuticals and luxury goods, (speaking at Lady Mayor’s Banquet)
“The export opportunities are huge,” Mr Starmer told the audience, which included senior executives. “And we will back you to seize them,” he added, hinting at a trip to Beijing.
https://www.thenationalnews.com/news/uk/2025/12/01/starmer-signals-uk-embrace-of-chinas-global-defining-force/
Germany also recognizing China as the next superpower….”VW Germany have taken steps to emulate the US capitalist’s success [Off shoring] Volkswagen says it can build an electric car entirely in China at roughly half the cost of producing one in Germany, helped by quicker development, lower labor expenses, easier battery sourcing and a more efficient supply chain”.
FT writes that the carmaker intends to introduce around 30 EV models in China over the next five years as it tries to regain momentum in the world’s largest auto market, where competition from domestic EV makers has eroded its earlier dominance. https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/vw-aims-cut-development-costs-half-new-made-china-car
How long before both countries recognize that Russia with its vast natural resources must be the key to its own competitive salvation? Not long I wager, cheap energy is again the key [as Germany is finding out to its cost] to industrial success.
‘“The export opportunities are huge,” Mr Starmer told the audience, which included senior executives. “And we will back you to seize them,” he added…’
I don’t much care for that word “seize”. But anyone who tries to seize anything from modern China will surely regret it.
Starmer’s new ‘China Station’. Opium for the masses …
“Volkswagen says it can build an electric car entirely in China at roughly half the cost of producing one in Germany, helped by quicker development, lower labor expenses, easier battery sourcing and a more efficient supply chain”.
But i wager the price will not be lower. All savings will be realised as increased profit !
What on earth is the point of a German company building a German car in China? It will differ from the scores of Chinese cars only by the name and its likely technical inferiority.
Some time ago the Chinese figured it out that the best way to grow their economy was to invite western capitalists to China, the Chinese offered them cheap labour and the fastest growing market in the world, one and a half billion people. The western capitalists could not resist and offered to sell the Chinese all their technology, patents etc. The Chinese agreed and the deal was done. the Chinese did not steal anything. The western capitalists did what is hard baked into the US way of doing things i.e. can I make a good profit ? Yes came the answer, and so they went and left the US with rust belts and economic decline.
Because China is the fastest growing economy on earth, its growth is such that Janet Yellen (Sec Treasury) made several trips to China during the Biden era where she told the Chinese that they must start doing business the way the US does, this is ridiculous, she, who is the loser to Chinese competition is complaining that the Chinese are “cheating” and mentioned that Chinese businesses have ‘overcapacity’, of course they do, that is economics 101, its called economies of scale i.e. when you produce on a large scale, it enables you to sell cheaply. one of the early successful capitalists in the UK Marks and Spencer had a philosophy of ‘pile it high, sell it cheap’. Richard D Wolff told this story and finished it off with this… After listening to Ms Yellen the Chinese delegation must have assembled in the local restaurant and they could not eat because they were laughing that much. They asked themselves what to make of this woman, does she not live on the same planet as us.
Harry. Although I’m sure China has in the past copied, appropriated, improved some western technologies we shouldn’t fall for the propaganda that they are only where they are because of underhand methods. The fact is that since the ‘New Enlightenment’, China has progressed massively; the three gorges project, electric cars, space station, computer chips, AI, etc. And many of these technologies are not just Chinese versions of Western technologies they are different, unique even. Where the west throws money, China uses it’s brainpower. The west has lost its ability to think, we are getting more stupid, and our governments are happy with that.
Here is the future China’s ‘xiaom’ robot factory works 24/7. Trump with his tariffs has lost the race and will have to play second fiddle to China. The reason manufacturing will not go back to America, is the reason manufacturing left in the first place, they could not compete.
” In 2023, Xiaomi unveiled a sprawling 81,000 square meter autonomous production facility — about the size of 11 soccer fields — that operates 24/7, without a single human on the floor. No lights. No breaks. No shifts.
This “dark factory” uses the company’s in-house Hyper Intelligent Manufacturing Platform (HyperIMP), an AI-powered ecosystem where machines don’t just follow orders — they think, adapt, and optimize.
[ … ]
Here’s the kicker:
Manufacturing Labor Cost in China (2023): $5.51/hour (source: Statista)
Cost of Running an Industrial Robot in China (Estimated): $1.60–$2.00/hour after amortization and maintenance
Translation? It’s now cheaper — and exponentially more efficient — to use robots than humans. ”
https://yourstory.com/2025/04/xiaomis-robot-factory-works-24-7-without-lights-breaks-people
Harry, with respect iirc, it was Jack Cohen, the TESCO founder who coined the phrase; “stack it high, sell it cheap”.
“…cheap energy is again the key [as Germany is finding out to its cost] to industrial success”.
Yes – and the German government has enthusiastically thrown the key into a swamp. It will be unable to back out, because politicians can never admit that they have made a mistake. And boy, was that a mistake!
But the scenario has an upside, as it teaches us how diametrically opposite the policies of modern “democratic” governments can be from the interests of the governed. Even the owners and executives of big German corporations know that they desperately need Russian oil and gas to succeed. Yet they cannot persuade “their” government to heal the breach, apologise, and re-establish supplies. (If, that is, they could find ways to prevent the USA from blowing up the pipelines again).
The policies of the German and French governments and the EU are absolutely contrary to the interests and wishes of most of their citizens. Which is also true of the UK, of course. See, for example, “Affluence and Influence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America” by Gilens and Page.
“Can a country be a democracy if its government only responds to the preferences of the rich? In an ideal democracy, all citizens should have equal influence on government policy–but as this book demonstrates, America’s policymakers respond almost exclusively to the preferences of the economically advantaged”.
Where those politicians and their policies came from is hard to say, but it certainly wasn’t in response to the wishes of the electorate. Which is a sufficient proof that the governments of Germany, France, and Britain are absolutely not democratic in any meaningful sense. Nor is the EU, of course, but no one ever seriously claimed that it is. Curious, how everyone was supposed to accept the imposition of a wholly undemocratic, bureaucratic system on top of – and overriding – all the national so-called “democracies”!
The export opportunities are huge. But not for U.K. and Germany. With the highest energy costs in the world our industry is doomed unless our government stops letting the energy industry milk us dry.
“And if certain governments did not behave as if laws and treaties – even the UN Charter – did not apply to them, there would be little or no “terrorism”.”
The ruling classes have never believed that laws apply to them. They know that the laws are there to protect them and to bind everyone else.
I wonder how much this act of terrorism on the part of the genocide supporting establishment and their political puppets cost altogether.
That’s OK – we taxpayers are paying for it.
“There are four ways in which you can spend money. You can spend your own money on yourself. When you do that, why then you really watch out what you’re doing, and you try to get the most for your money.
“Then you can spend your own money on somebody else. For example, I buy a birthday present for someone. Well, then I’m not so careful about the present, but I’m very careful about the cost.
“Then, I can spend somebody else’s money on myself. And if I spend somebody else’s money on myself, then I’m sure going to have a good lunch!
“Finally, I can spend somebody else’s money on somebody else. And if I spend somebody else’s money on somebody else, I’m not concerned about how much it is, and I’m not concerned about what I get. And that’s government. And that’s close to 40% of our national income”.
– Milton Friedman (1912-2006)
This is not complicated.
The entire uk political class is united as never before, and they have no priority other than The War On Russia. Specifically, in getting the Americans to go to war on britain’s behalf.
Again.
For their part, the Americans are awfully touchy when it comes to Israel. If anything, this will be used as a selling point “See, we basically chucked out law that had been in effect since the restated Magna Carta all to make you happy so you owe us big time now!”
I believe the priority is actually money and Russia is only the latest bogeyman. War means the economy gives the illusion of prosperity and that’s because we don’t do proper manufacturing of anything anymore. Without beating war drums our economies would collapse because of the massive debts built up. Peace means bankruptcy, pizza deliveries and call centres will never lift us out of the hole we are in. A reckoning is coming.
“See, we basically chucked out law that had been in effect since the restated Magna Carta all to make you happy so you own us big time now!”
FTFY. 😎
Vey pleased that Natalie was found not guilty.
” But I have to construe it according to strict legal principles”.
The Honourable Judge did just that from the looks of it.
A rare man of his world in the Hall of Mirrors of legal UK jargon.
Fortunately he used Jersey legal jargon instead.
The UK wants to get rid of Juries it seems due to backlog and the cost of 12 Good men and Women and true..
As ever with this government it about saving money – then this saved money can be donated to the 5% Military spending of GDP to assist the US in undermining China and Russia and the whole BRICS project.
Meanwhile: The Ukraine/Russia war could be all over by XMAS..
Now where have I heard that particular phrase before?
” But I have to construe it according to strict legal principles”.
Is it wrong of me to think of Groucho Marx?
“Those are my principles. If you don’t like them I have others”.
There are many legal principles. It takes an artist to select the right ones for any given occasion.
“The Ukraine/Russia war could be all over by XMAS”.
It’s virtually over now. All that remains is to see whether Mr Zelensky flees or is killed. In a couple of years respectable opinion will be agreeing that it was all a regrettable misunderstanding that should never have happened. A part of Russia tried to secede, and was prevented from doing so by violence – as in the USA in 1861-5.
I was under the impression that it was part of Ukraine that wanted to secede – and seems to have succeeded, thanks to timely help from its neighbour Russia.
The cry, from some, was for independence. What they have is direct rule from Moscow, something they were overjoyed to be rid of once upon a time.
https://ukraine.89-91.archivum.org/#chapter5-6-3
See how long they put with it this time.
The right of the four Russian speaking oblast’s plus Crimea to secede is part of the UN charter, i.e. All peoples have the right to self determination. The old Soviet Union was dissolved in 1990, now Russia is a prosperous capitalist state with an abundance of natural resources, which it is willing to sell to the rest of the world, to the immediate benefit of the Russian state including the parts which seceded recently. You must put aside your hatred of Russia and accept it into the evolving new Multi polar world, or die fighting for a Uni polar world dominated by the US and yapping vassals like Starmer, Merz and Macron and other ‘coalitions of the willing’
“something they were overjoyed to be rid of once upon a time.”
And were equally overjoyed to be given it back in 2022*. Unlike politicians and some blog commenters, peoples aren’t shy of admitting when they made a mistake.
*except for Crimea, who were only overjoyed the second time round.
These Oblasts claimed independence in 2014, a move the UN condemned as illegal under most definitions of international law. In 2022 the leaders of the independence movement were squeezed out and replaced with Kremlin placeholders who bowed to total annexation by Russia.
https://theins.ru/en/politics/258061
I’m sure they’re enjoying the shortages, 8% inflation, growing inequality, recession, loss of sovereignty and Russia plundering their resources, the sale of which benefits only Putin’s oligarch friends.
I’ve noted the comparison to the US Civil War.
In this case the South was able to separate relatively peacefully due to a crisis & meltdown within the federal government.
Then spent 25 years under foreign tutelage, drove itself completely mad, had a few coups, tried to bloodily suppress any pro-Unionist sentiment and provoked a losing war with the much more powerful and reconstituted North.
In the conventional/actual history. Ukraine is currently in an equivalent to the CSA’s position circa 1864. They’re still some distance from final defeat, but the war is already clearly lost with recovery neigh impossible.
One can also expect a “lost cause” & “war of rights” mythos to fester on. Even if the larger cause itself is effectively dead…
Abolish juries because this injustice will beget justice. Hmmmm
Since these cases inevitably revolve around the UK government’s policies on Israel and Palestine it is absolutely imperative that Jews who oppose Zionism put themselves directly in the line of fire here. This will place courts and juries in a difficult position and expose the ridiculousness of government policy which has forever relied on the argument that its support for Zionism is grounded in support for Jews. I wish I could help but I myself am based in Italy. However, I am a skilled writer and I think I know how to respond to the kind of chicanery being foisted on the public through the courts. If you need concrete support in the form of text, I am available. My mother was a hidden child, my aunt a decorated war hero and survivor of Auschwitz and I have enough dead grandparents to support my arguments. I have posten online for a long time and all my articles are available.
Bravo!
Daniel: could you provide links to some of your work? My browser directs me to a namesake of yours who died in a car crash.
Very good news that she was released.
Not such great news that this prosecution was ever brought in the first place. The judge said: “We wish to make it clear to the defendant and others that they need to be really careful about what they say.”
So that’s the sort of country Britain is now. Be really careful about what you say, with an unspoken undercurrent of, “Best not to say anything at all”.
Our legendary free speech and freedoms long since abandoned, in the supposed aim of keeping us safe from terrorists. Just two things wrong with that – it’s not keeping us safe, and what’s being prosecuted is obviously not terrorism.
Chomsky used to say that the US Army has a perfectly good definition of terrorism, and he saw no need to label it in any other way, which basically said it was the use of attacks against civilians or government structures in order to coerce a state or a people to behave in a required way.
Strikes me that the government is the one terrorising the population now.
Since Chomsky said that, I think you will find that Western governments have tweaked their definitions to say that governments cannot be terrorist!
They would say that, wouldn’t they?
“I think you will find that Western governments have tweaked their definitions to say that governments cannot be terrorist!”
No, that only applies to “us”. “Our” governments can’t be terrorists, but “their” governments can, e.g. Venezuela.
‘So that’s the sort of country Britain is now. Be really careful about what you say, with an unspoken undercurrent of, “Best not to say anything at all”’.
That’s what my womenfolk keep telling me. I am powerfully reminded of a story my mother used to relate about her experiences in Germany in the 1930s when, as a teacher of French and German in Scotland, she holidayed in Germany.
Once, walking with German friends, she made room for them on the pavement and walked with one foot on the kerb and the other on the street. A friend hauled her onto the pavement and warned her, “Don’t walk like that! They’ll think you’re making fun of Goebbels!” (who was lame).
We are very nearly there. The main difference is that in the 1930s Germans were supremely proud of their nation and their identity, whereas today British people are shamefully guilty about both.
“Natalie Strecker speaks after acquittal: stay focused on Palestine and other genocides”
by Skwawkbox, 2 December 2025
https://www.thecanary.co/skwawkbox/2025/12/02/strecker-palestine/
Yes our current government announcing their intent to further restrict jury trials is evil, and Lammy is an idiot.
Everyone should write to their MP about this, especially if they have a Labour MP, and express their objections to it, and that even if they support Labour, this is a red line not to be crossed. If this goes ahead, and assuming the regime allow a GE in 2029, it will be a tactical vote for anyone but Labour.
As to this case, it seems the woman was acquitted.
Anyway, Jersey is not the UK. Jersey has its own government, and they can handle their own affairs. It is for their electorate to hold their government to account, including the form in which they have trials.