Why I risked prison to shut Elbit down
JANUARY 10, 2024- The co-founder of Palestine Action writes about her and fellow activists’ acquittal by a UK court for attempting to close down the Israeli arms firm’s operations in Britain.
“For over a decade, the UK has been a safe haven for Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer, Elbit Systems. ”
“Elbit’s business model involves manufacturing bullets, drones, combat vehicles, electronic warfare systems and missiles, using the Israeli state’s criminal attacks on Gaza as opportunities to test and develop their latest lethal inventions.
"The company was born out of a need to profit from and maintain Israel’s brutal occupation of the Palestinian people.”
“Since 7 October, Israel has killed over 23,000 Palestinians, 9,600 of them being children, injured more than 58,000 people, destroyed over 70% of Gaza’s civil infrastructure and displaced over 1.9m people. ”
“Elbit’s CEO Bezhalel Machlis boasted that the company is crucial to the ongoing genocide and has been thanked by the Israeli military for its services.”
Palestine Action defendants including Huda Ammori (4th from right) outside court. (Photo: Martin Pope via Getty)
“During Israel’s intensified genocide of the Palestinian people, I was sitting in the dock of a court facing 11 charges for disrupting the production of weapons used to murder them. ”
“Between the eight of us on trial, there were 35 counts on the indictment to defeat. ”
“Our state’s complicity in the occupation of Palestine left me with no other viable option than direct action”
“Ultimately, we walked in facing varying amounts of prison time and received none. I was told if convicted on all the charges facing me I would be looking at a 4-5 year prison sentence."
”Yet we all walked out as free people, and two of the eight were acquitted of all charges. An incredible result when facing the British state’s wrath for having stood on the right side of history. "
