UK Continues Use of Anti-Terrorism Law to Arrest Palestine Defenders
"1984 has arrived and is alive and well in the United Kingdom," said musician Roger Waters.
At least a dozen police officers raided the home of British pro-Palestine activist and journalist Sarah Wilkinson on Thursday over "content that she has posted online" that allegedly ran afoul of the United Kingdom's anti-terrorism law.
"The police came to her house just before 7:30 am," Wilkinson's son, Jack Wilkinson, said on social media. "There were 12 of them in total, some of them in plain clothes from the counterterrorism police... Her house is being raided and they have seized all her electronic devices."
Police—who later freed Wilkinson on bail—did not disclose what content she posted that led to her arrest. Wilkinson has been a tireless critic of the U.K. government's support for Israel and has posted many images of the death and destruction in Gaza, where Israeli forces have killed and wounded more than 144,000 Palestinians. Israel is on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice.
"The British prime minister is determined to terrorize into silence critics highlighting his, and now his government's, complicity with Israel and its genocide in Gaza."
Pro-Israel media reported Wilkinson called the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas-led militants an "incredible infiltration" and hailed the late Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh—who was assassinated last month in Iran—as a "hero."
Section 12 of the U.K.'s Terrorism Act of 2000 criminalizes anyone who "invites support for a proscribed organization" or "expresses an opinion or belief that is supportive" of such a group. Violators can be punished with up to 14 years' imprisonment and a fine. Hamas is included on the U.K. government's list of proscribed groups.
Critics say the U.K. government uses the highly controversial anti-terror law to silence dissent.
Israel-based British journalist Thomas Cook said in a Friday blog post that Wilkinson's arrest is "definitive proof" that U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer's "authoritarian purges of the Labour left are being rolled out against critics on a nationwide basis."
"The British prime minister is determined to terrorize into silence critics highlighting his, and now his government's, complicity with Israel and its genocide in Gaza," Cook added.
Musician and staunch Israel critic Roger Waters, who co-founded the rock band Pink Floyd, said in a video posted Thursday on social media that Wilkinson was arrested "for standing up for human rights and campaigning against genocide."
"If you allow this to stand, the arrest of Sarah Wilkinson and the persecution of my friend Craig Murray among others, then you have absolutely accepted that England is now a fascist state," Waters asserted, adding that "1984 has arrived and is alive and well in the United Kingdom."
In addition to her pro-Palestine activism, Wilkinson is a news contributor for the Lebanon-based news site MENA Uncensored.
"The pro-genocide U.K. regime has arrested MENA Uncensored's roving reporter and human rights activist Sarah Wilkinson for supporting the Palestinian resistance and relaying what is really happening in Gaza and the West Bank to the world," the outlet said on social media.
Wilkinson's arrest came one week after Syrian-British independent journalist Richard Medhurst was apprehended at London's Heathrow Airport and held for nearly 24 hours for allegedly violating Section 12 with social media posts "expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organization."
Richard Barnard, co-founder of the London-based group Palestine Action—with which Wilkinson has been involved—is also facing three criminal charges for two speeches allegedly supporting a proscribed organization.
