London’s Metropolitan Police said they arrested at least 139 people on October 31 as hundreds demonstrated outside the U.S. embassy against the ban on Palestine Action, Al Jazeera reported. Police said most arrests were for expressing support for a proscribed organisation.
The protest took place before a Supreme Court appeal scheduled for Wednesday challenging the group’s proscription. Palestine Action has been designated a terrorist organisation under UK law since July 2025, when the ban took effect under then-Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government.
Labour MP John McDonnell disputed the idea that opposition to the ban necessarily amounts to support for the organisation. Responding to the police announcement, he argued that protesting a government decision should not automatically be treated as an arrestable offence and said the designation was wrong.
Defend Our Juries, which organised the demonstrations, said the latest arrests brought the number made in protests defying the ban to more than 4,000 since July 2025. That cumulative figure was the organisers’ count.
A parallel demonstration took place outside the U.S. consulate in Edinburgh. Al Jazeera reported no arrests there. Placards at both gatherings expressed opposition to genocide and support for Palestine Action.
Felix Jakens, Amnesty International UK’s head of communications and campaigns, urged the government to reverse the ban. He described the arrests of people peacefully holding placards as an attack on freedom of speech and called for changes to protest laws.