Activists on trial for targeting Israel-linked arms factory. Again.
"Palestine Action" activists charged with planning to damage Shenstone factory UAV Engines
A group of 5 activists linked to “Palestine Action” including Tony Greenstein, the son of a Jewish Rabbi, are currently on trial at Wolverhampton Crown Court for planning to damage the premises of an Israel-linked arms factory.
According to another report, Greenstein is alleged to have hired a van in Brighton and driven it to Walsall to pick up the protesters who were wearing boiler suits in a van loaded with “smoke bombs, ladders, red paint, sledge hammers, cans of spray paint, superglue, a crowbar and adapted fire extinguishers.”
The van was stopped by police at around 3am in Walsall on March 9th, 2021.
Greenstein and four other defendants, Ibrahim Samadi, Alex Waters, Helen Caney and Jeremy Parker have denied the charge, while a 6th person has plead guilty and will be sentenced after the trial which is expected to last 3 weeks.
Yesterday, I met with a supporter of the activist’s cause outside the court and enjoyed a short conversation with him. His name is Zahid. Watch our talk here:
https://rumble.com/v2g55aq-activists-on-trial-for-planning-to-damage-uk-weapons-company.html
As we alluded to in our conversation, it is going to be interesting to see the developments in this case over the next few weeks.
While around 280 activists associated with Palestine Action have been arrested, many for damaging premises linked to UAV Engines parent company, Elbit Systems, only a handful have been successfully convicted.
This is only the second Crown Court case and the first went down in flames for the prosecution. In November 2022 at Southwark Court in London a jury took just one hour to return a unanimous “not guilty” verdict.
I have reported from the premises of UAV Engines on a couple of occasions. The last time was around a year ago after a group climbed onto the roof and did a hella lot of damage while up there.
They closed the entire operation for at least a week, and have been disrupting it with protests ever since.
Security almost jumped all over me when I arrived the day after the police had finally got the activists down from that roof. I’m glad he didn’t, though, the size of him would have flattened me like a pancake.
I can’t imagine what it is like for the activists that actually got up on the roof, they must have been scared out of their wits. In some cases, the security guards literally get on the roof themselves and attempt to drag down the activists by force. It must be petrifying on a roof in the first place without some sweaty out of shape security guard chasing after them while they’re up there.
I can imagine WHY they get up on that roof, though.
Israel is an Apartheid state. Every human rights organization on the planet agrees. An illegal military occupation is operating a racist form of segregation against the Palestinian people, and the weapons that uphold it might be being made around the corner from your Mom’s house.
An Apartheid state is murdering thousands in a clear case of ethnic cleansing and borderline genocide, is killing journalists reporting on their crimes with impunity and then ruins their funerals, while companies in the UK profit from the weapons used in these crimes against humanity. I wonder if any of these details will come up in the next couple of weeks?
It’s going to be an interesting trial.
Elbit Systems operates 13 sites in the UK, employs over 600 people according to their website.