U.K. to Ban Palestine Action Group as Terrorist Organization

Europe|Group That Vandalized Trump Golf Course Faces U.K. Ban Under Terror Law

The British government has announced that it will ban as a terrorist group a pro-Palestinian organization that broke into a British air base on Friday and vandalized President Trump’s Turnberry golf resort in Scotland in March.

Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, announced the move against the group, Palestine Action, on Monday, three days after members damaged military planes using red paint at Britain’s largest air force base, at Brize Norton in Oxfordshire.

In a statement on Monday, Ms. Cooper said that a legal order to ban the group would be formally submitted to Parliament on June 30. She said the group had “orchestrated a nationwide campaign of direct criminal action” against defense companies and other targets, putting Britain’s national security at risk, and that its activities met the legal definition of terrorism because they included “serious damage to property.”

Palestine Action will join more than 80 groups banned as terrorist organizations by the British government, including the Islamic State, Hamas, Hezbollah and Al Qaeda, as well as Atomwaffen Division, a white supremacist group.

Jonathan Hall, the British government’s top adviser on terrorism laws, told The New York Times that to his knowledge the ban of Palestine Action would be the “first time that a group has been proscribed on the basis of serious damage to property” in Britain, rather than because of the use of, or support for, serious violence.

He said that the targeting of the air force base had moved the group’s activities into “the zone of national security” and had acted as “a tipping point” for the government.