Judicial review of Palestine Action proscription challenge to be heard in November
9 October 2025
Protestors outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London demonstrate against Palestine Action’s proscription in July 2025. Credit: Pete Speller / Shutterstock.
The substantive hearing for the judicial review of the challenge to protest group Palestine Action’s proscription is set to be heard over 25-27 November.
The case awaits a judgement from the Court of Appeal, following the Home Office’s appeal that the legal challenge should be brought to the Home Secretary and then the Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission (POAC), rather than by judicial review.
On 25 September, the Home Office asked the Court of Appeal to overturn Mr Justice Chamberlain’s decision to grant Palestine Action co-founder Huda Ammori a judicial review of the proscription in July.
The Court of Appeal judgement is expected later this month, prior to the judicial review’s substantive hearing in November.
Huda Ammori’s legal representatives, which include Garden Court North’s Mira Hammad and Rosalind Burgin, argue that the case is “unique.” POAC would not hear the case until the middle of 2026, whereas a judicial review could take place in the autumn.
Matrix Chambers’ Raza Husain KC, one of the leading counsel for Huda Ammori, also pointed to the uniqueness of “the proscription of a protest group with widespread popular support, and the severe detriments that would flow from the POAC route on these facts, including: the ongoing and irremediable chilling of speech and assembly in the interim; the delayed determination of a matter relevant to ongoing criminal cases; and the fact that the POAC route offers no remedy to the hundreds of people already arrested for offences related to support for Palestine Action”.
Estimates for arrests and charges since Palestine Action have been proscribed vary, but as of 25 September, there were reports that more than 1,600 people had been arrested for allegedly expressing support for Palestine Action since the ban came into force, of whom 138 have been charged. A further 488 arrests were reportedly made on 4 October 2025 for alleged support of a proscribed organisation, with the youngest person held aged 18 and the oldest aged 89.
Palestine Action’s proscription and the ECHR
On 23 June 2025, the then Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced the decision to proscribe Palestine Action.
The ban came into force on 4 July 2025, making it a terrorist offence to, for example, identify as a member of Palestine Action. The proscription also criminalises expressing support for Palestine Action, and wearing clothing or carrying articles in public which arouse reasonable suspicion that someone is a member or supporter of Palestine Action.
On 20 July, Mr Justice Chamberlain and the High Court granted Huda Ammori permission to challenge the proscription on two grounds.
Firstly, that proscription of Palestine Action is a “disproportionate interference” with Article 10 (Freedom of Expression) and Article 11 (Freedom of Assembly) of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Justice Chamberlain’s comments on this ground include references to the proscription’s effect on free speech regarding the “deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza”.
Secondly, permission was granted on the ground that the Home Secretary should have consulted with Palestine Action before making her decision to proscribe.
In September, a United Nations commission of inquiry said that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The report concluded that four of the five genocidal acts defined under international law have been carried out since October 2023: killing members of a group, causing them serious bodily and mental harm, deliberately inflicting conditions calculated to destroy the group, and preventing births.
In July, UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk said that the proscription of Palestine Action represented a “disturbing” misuse of counter-terrorism legislation in the UK.
Days before the proscription of Palestine Action came into force, UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese published a report into the ”corporate entities profiting from Israel’s economy of illegal occupation, apartheid and now, genocide… while political leaders and Governments shirk their obligations”.
Garden Court North’s Mira Hammad and Rosalind Burgin are led by Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh KC and Raza Husain KC of Matrix Chambers, alongside Owen Greenhall and Audrey Mogan (Garden Court Chambers), and Grant Kynaston and Paul Luckhurst (Blackstone Chambers). They are instructed by Birnberg Peirce and Kellys Solicitors.
Additional media
The Guardian – Fate of hundreds arrested for alleged Palestine Action support in limbo if challenge to ban is blocked, court told
United Nations – UN experts urge United Kingdom not to misuse terrorism laws against protest group Palestine Action
High Court – Ammori v SSHD Approved Judgment 300725
For further information, please contact Alex Blair, Communications Manager at Garden Court North Chambers: ablair@gcnchambers.co.uk
