A personal view
Tony Greenstein’s acquittal on a charge of “inviting support” for Hamas as a proscribed organisation under the Terrorism Act, is a huge relief for him personally – he could have faced 14 years in jail for this fraudulent charge. It is also a hugely welcome victory for defenders of the Palestinian people, who are actively opposing Israel’s genocidal onslaught, and its wars in the Middle East.
It is one of several victories for Palestine defenders recently, notably including the victory of David Miller at the Employment Appeals Tribunal, which upheld the judgement of the Employment Tribunal against Bristol University for unlawfully discriminating against him because of his Anti-Zionist views, and sacking him from his academic post in 2021. This victory has set a legal precedent, that anti-Zionist views are a protected philosophical belief under the Equality Act, potentially a major legal gain which the Palestine movement must fight hard to enforce against witchhunters in the workplace.
On top of that, the Jury in the Filton 8 Elbit case against Palestine Action activists failed to reach verdicts on almost all the charges; five other former PA activists in Preston who damaged a branch of Barclays Bank were given Conditional Discharges after the jury convicted them of criminal damage only after the judge guaranteed that no ‘terrorist element’ conviction would be added to their sentence. It appears that this outrageous imposition, outside the jury’s control, simply means that juries are more unwilling to convict of minor charges. In Shenstone, 4 other activists were also given Conditional Discharges for damaging an Elbit-run drone factory after they were allowed to raise political defences – obviously also because of the fear that juries will not convict.
Tony Greenstein is a contradictory figure who spent years as a leading member of the Socialist Labour Network, was a founder of Labour Against the Witchhunt, one of our predecessors in Labour during the Corbyn leadership. Given the right circumstances, he is unfortunately capable of acting as a witchhunter against those to HIS left. He has been virulent against some in our ranks who characterise Israel as imperialist in its own right and that its power in the West is primarily because of the disproportionately large layer of diaspora Zionist Jews in positions of property and power. The factual basis of this is easily evidenced – the implications of it should have been debated in a manner consistent with working-class democracy, but Tony virulently opposed that.
His contradictory politics is illustrated by his heroic defiance of (arguably) the same bourgeois layer he will denounce you as ‘anti-Semitic’ for identifying. This Judge, Sarah Plaschkes, whom he defied with great mastery and courage is arguably a prime specimen of the judicial manifestation of that putative layer. She was apoplectic with rage at Tony’s defiance, which is excellent!
The post on his blog on this is a classic masterpiece, a wonderful manual of how to defend yourself against these genocidal fraudsters, including in judicial form, and should be both treasured and used as a work of reference in future cases.
