--- title: "On Halloween, London Police Arrest 139 Over Signs Backing a Banned Group" description: "Retirees with placards were taken from outside the US embassy days before the Supreme Court hears a challenge to the Palestine Action ban" author: "Jan Sokol" published: 2026-10-31T18:48:29Z modified: 2026-11-01T01:12:38Z url: https://rews.cc/a/on-halloween-london-police-arrest-139-over-signs-backing-a-b-4a8821 language: en tags: ["politics", "trump", "security", "law", "protest", "europe", "world"] publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)" --- # On Halloween, London Police Arrest 139 Over Signs Backing a Banned Group *Retirees with placards were taken from outside the US embassy days before the Supreme Court hears a challenge to the Palestine Action ban* By Jan Sokol · October 31, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/on-halloween-london-police-arrest-139-over-signs-backing-a-b-4a8821 ## In brief - London police arrested at least 139 people at a 31 October protest outside the US embassy against the Palestine Action ban - Many protesters were retirees holding signs reading “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action” - A vigil outside the US Consulate in Edinburgh led to no arrests, but Police Scotland is seeking to identify participants - Support for the group carries up to 14 years in prison; organisers say more than 4,000 people have been detained since July 2025 - The UK Supreme Court hears co-founder Huda Ammori’s appeal against the proscription on 4 and 5 November 2026 The police had warned them not to come. On Saturday, 31 October, they came anyway: hundreds of people outside the United States embassy in London, gathered to oppose a law that makes it a crime to say a certain group’s name with approval. By the evening, [Al Jazeera reported](https://aljazeera.com/news/2026/10/31/london-police-arrest-48-as-hundreds-protest-palestine-action-ban), at least 139 of them had been arrested. The count rose through the day. Early reports gave 48. The Metropolitan Police later put it at 139 and said more arrests were expected, since officers were still at the scene. Most of those detained, according to the police, were held for expressing support for a proscribed organisation. The organisation is Palestine Action. Under United Kingdom law it is a terrorist group. The ban took effect in July last year, under the government of Keir Starmer, then prime minister. ## The faces in the vans The people who came were not, for the most part, young. Many were retirees, [the Associated Press reported](https://www.wsls.com/news/world/2026/10/31/dozens-arrested-outside-us-embassy-in-london-for-supporting-proscribed-pro-palestinian-group/), and many carried the same words on their placards: “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action.” One protester climbed a tree outside the embassy with a placard. When people were led away to police vans, others applauded and chanted “free, free Palestine”, [CBS News reported](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/dozens-arrested-us-embassy-london-pro-palestinian-group/). The date had been fixed in advance. Some 400 people had said they planned, on Halloween, to [confess to a terrorism offence in cardboard](https://rews.cc/a/on-halloween-400-people-plan-to-confess-to-a-terrorism-offen-3082f9): that is, by holding up a sign. A month earlier, police had [arrested a 94-year-old barrister](https://rews.cc/a/british-barrister-94-is-arrested-for-supporting-banned-group-b2ae95) for supporting the same group. This is the form the dispute has taken. The offence is the placard, and the placard is the protest. ![Three elderly protesters holding blank placards approach an open police van as an officer gestures toward it, rendered in black and cream above red ground.](https://rews.cc/img/f4505856d00f5f5109d69d81495c678deb7c7a7a.webp) Four hundred miles to the north, in Edinburgh, a similar vigil gathered outside the US Consulate with similar placards. No one was arrested there. Police Scotland said it was working to identify people seen in T-shirts and with banners showing support for a proscribed organisation, and that “further action will be taken as appropriate.” ## The arithmetic of a ban Membership of, or support for, Palestine Action carries a sentence of up to 14 years in prison. Defend Our Juries, the activist group that organised Saturday’s protest, says more than 4,000 people have been detained since July 2025 for defying the ban. It called this “truly dystopian”, and described the gatherings as “peaceful vigils silently expressing opposition to genocide.” The group itself was founded in 2020 with the aim of ending British military support for Israel, which it accuses of genocide; Israel strongly denies the accusation. Its methods were physical. In 2024 its activists damaged equipment at an Elbit Systems UK factory. In June 2025 they broke into an RAF base and damaged two tanker planes. The proscription followed. In August, the United States sanctioned Palestine Action as a terrorist group too, which lends a certain symmetry to the choice of the American embassy as the place to stand. ![Black handcuffs, one open and one fastened around a wooden protest sign handle, lie on a textured cream background with bold red shadows.](https://rews.cc/img/d5943c51d259f2a91920bd4f11d745f3e10da659.webp) A reflection, and only that: a state that criminalises a sign has to keep arresting the people who hold it, and every arrest becomes a new sign. The law intended to silence a group of saboteurs has produced a queue of pensioners waiting, in effect, to be counted. ## Wednesday in Parliament Square The courts have not agreed with one another about any of this. In February 2026 the High Court ruled the proscription an unlawful interference with the rights to free expression and assembly under Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, while leaving the ban in place so the government could appeal. On 15 June 2026 the Court of Appeal reversed that, finding the ban lawful and proportionate. In July the Supreme Court [granted permission to appeal](https://gardencourtchambers.co.uk/supreme-court-grants-permission-to-appeal-palestine-action-terrorism-proscription/) to Huda Ammori, the group’s co-founder. The case, *R (on the application of Ammori) v Secretary of State for the Home Department*, is [listed for 4 and 5 November 2026](https://www.supremecourt.uk/cases/uksc-2026-0099). The question the court has set itself is whether the home secretary’s decision to proscribe Palestine Action under section 3 of the Terrorism Act 2000 was lawful. Ammori’s barristers are led by Raza Husain KC and Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh KC, [according to the Jerusalem Post](https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-904698). So the sequence stands like this. On Saturday, the police arrested 139 people for supporting the group, and said there would be more. On Wednesday, five days later, the country’s highest court begins hearing whether the government was entitled to ban it at all.