GAZA CITY - Secours Islamique France is a respected aid agency, part of the global Islamic Relief network based in the UK, but when it comes to helping Palestinians in Gaza, its operations are challenged by both Israeli bureaucracy and its own “no-contact” policy with the Hamas officials who control the territory. Hamas is branded a “terror” organization by most western countries, despite their victory in the 2006 Palestinian legislative council elections. That requires Secours Islamique France, and all other international charities working in Gaza, to tread extremely carefully to avoid falling foul of anti-terror legislation. US rules, specifically their definition of providing support to terrorism, are the most stringent, according to a paper on Counter-terrorism and Humanitarian Action by the Humanitarian Policy Group (HPG), part of Britain’s Overseas Development Institute. “In the US, no knowledge or intention to support terrorism per se is required [for criminal responsibility] if...

Three terror suspects whose freedom is restricted by control orders have won a legal battle in the House of Lords over the use of secret evidence. Nine Law Lords unanimously ruled it was unfair individuals should be kept in ignorance of the case against them. More at the BBC This follows news that the police have been learning some new tricks. Six London police officers are being investigated for torturing suspects - using a bit of waterboarding .

Haringey Stop the War Coalition Email haringey@stopwar.org.uk Bulletin: 27 May 2009 PUBLIC MEETING: ISLAMOPHOBIA: INNOCENCE BEHIND BARS DATE: TUESDAY 2ND JUNE, 7.00PM VENUE: TURNPIKE LANE MOSQUE, 389 WIGHTMAN ROAD, N8 0NA There is now extensive evidence of collusion by the British secret services in the torture of Muslims who were kidnapped and "rendered" to countries where torture of prisoners is allowed. Following the latest case to come to light, Britain's home secretary Jacqui Smith faces legal action over allegations that MI5 agents colluded in the torture of Jamil Rahman, a British former civil servant, by Bangladeshi intelligence officers. (See http://bit.ly/RaB9P ) On Tuesday 2 June, MOAZZEM BEGG, former detainee at Guantanamo prison, is speaking in Haringey at a public meeting on the issue ISLAMOPHOBIA: INNOCENCE BEHIND BARS. The venue is Turnpike Lane Mosque. The meeting is supported by Haringey Stop the War and is open to all. MOAZZEM BEGG, a British citizen, w...

Saturday 23 May - assemble 3pm Trafalgar Square March via Downing Street to New Scotland Yard. The United Campaign Against Police Violence has called a national demonstration to highlight the issues of police violence and demand justice for those who have died in police custody. The police tactic of "kettling" demonstrators - essentially detaining protestors and bystanders without charge - will be turned on its head on the protest, when we kettle New Scotland Yard . At the end of the protest there will be a naming of the dead for those who have died in police custody, led by the families of the bereaved who have yet to receive justice. Over 1000 people have died in police custody in the last 40 years - yet no one has been found responsible. Protestors will demand the disbanding of the Territorial Support Group , the resignation of "Independent" Police Complaints Commission chair Nick Hardwick , justice for those killed in police custody and for the right to protes...

GAZA, ( PIC )-- Dr. Ahmed Bahar, the acting speaker of the Palestinian legislative council, has described the British government's decision to ban entry of Hamas MP Dr. Younis Al-Astal into its territory as "hostile" to the Palestinian people. Bahar in a statement on Wednesday said that Britain was not content with its political and material support for Israel and its "ominous" role in the creation of that "entity" on the usurped lands of Palestine following the Balfour Declaration but now is issuing another "oppressive" decision against the Palestinian people. "We in the chairmanship of the PLC affirm that the Palestinian people are free to choose their representatives especially in the latest legislative elections of January 2006, which the entire world testified to its integrity," he elaborated. The acting speaker said that London should have rather issued decisions against the Israeli war criminals who committed massacr...

The terror laws have basically replaced the hated Sus laws that led to urban rebellions by black youths in the late 70s and early 80s. If the pigs carry on like this they can expect to get a bloody good hiding, to quote the late Bernie Grant MP speaking after the murder of a black woman, Cynthia Jarrett, by police and the subsequent death of a cop in riots that followed on the huge housing estate (project) at Broadwater Farm in Tottenham, north London in 1985. This war on terror is an excuse for a war on working class kids, especially Black and Asian ones. Boris Johnson, the London mayor, today defended the use of stop and search powers in London as it emerged that the capital's police stop someone every three minutes. Johnson, who is also chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority, was challenged as figures obtained by the BBC under the Freedom of Information Act show the Metropolitan police used section 44 of the Terrorism Act – allowing them to search any person or vehicle wit...

From Iraq to Palestine Occupation is a crime ...and that includes Afghanistan, where the western 'liberators' today killed at least 100 civilians in an air strike . NATO, the coalition, or whatever they call themselves, will perhaps say sorry but will carry on with their indiscriminate killing and wonder why they can't, and will never, win this war. (Photograph: Abdul Malek/AP). Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and U.S. President Barack Obama are meeting today to discuss how they can arrest Pakistan's descent into the abyss. Ex-US spy and Afghan President Hamid Karzai is also in on the talks, despite Washington's intention to circumvent/depose him . The US watches in horror as the Taliban get nearer to the nuclear trigger but fail to understand how it is there policy of formenting civil war in the country in the name of the war on terror that has brought the country to the precipice. The Pakistan government is now doing its master's bidding and preparing to ...

Yet another bogus terror trial ends with no convictions. How much more money are the authorities going to waste on spreading their 'state of fear'? Three men have been cleared of helping to plan the 7/7 London suicide attacks. A re-trial jury at Kingston Crown Court found them not guilty of conspiring with the 2005 bombers by organising a reconnaissance mission to London. Waheed Ali, 25, Sadeer Saleem, 28, and Mohammed Shakil, 32, all from Leeds, admitted knowing the bombers - but denied helping them. more at the BBC

[update 16:07 BST] Asif Ali Zardari's pulls out of press conference in Islamabad after Brown calls country 'terror crucible'. Gordon Brown this morning made it clear he is following the US game plan - Afghanistan and Pakistan are the 'crucible of terrorism' he tells us, as the UK government announces more troops for the Afghan disaster. Pakistan is desperately trying to block a drive by the Taliban in the Swat valley towards the Afghan border. The US has demanded this offensive. Thousands of ordinary people are fleeing the Malakand division. Clinton says she couldn't 'even contemplate' a situation where Pakistan's nuclear weapons are at risk. Gordon Brown sees no contradiction in appealing to Pakistan to step up its civil war in the name of the war on terror, while detaining its students on false terrorism charges here in the UK. The Swat Taliban remain defiant. Overnight the militants seized control of a telephone exchange in Bahrain, a village in...

Judging by the results being delivered by the counter terrorism spies in the Muslim community we can only conclude that either they are plain stupid or they are used to identify any Muslim person that uses the internet too much, shows an interest in world affairs and has been on a demo. They don't need spies for that kind of work - all they need are secret police to do round-ups of everyone that fits that profile - that's to say hundreds of thousands of Muslims in the UK, and some internment camps. As George Galloway pointed out the Stop the War Coalition conference yesterday alienating Muslims is not going to stop terrorism, on the contrary it may makes such acts more likely. And as for spying on campaign groups, political parties and protesters - don't worry about it. There is an old socialist saying: if we all spat at once we'd drown the bastards. We are many, they are few. No police spy has ever stopped a revolution. Link to audio

Lord Carlile, who is laughably meant to be the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, is bringing forward his review of the repressive war on terror laws introduced by this rotten government. It follows the succession of terror raids, which only yesterday Gaza Solidarity called for an inquiry into, that have led to no one being charged. The raids are so obviously political and have nothing to do with 'terror plots' that our rulers thought they had better respond to the way in which habeas corpus has been ripped up - unless you think all Muslim students are potential terrorists as well as climate camp protesters 'from some of the best universities and schools in the country'. This 'independent inquiry' will be about as independent as the Independent Police Complaints Commission. Fight the system on the streets, not in that talking shop called parliament where they all get fat on our taxes.

Photograph Guy Smallman The Trainer – is a surreal comedy about the ‘terror’ laws as they descend into farce. Composer Keith Burstein sues the Evening Standard after being accused of 'glorifying' terror in his opera, Manifest Destiny. When his case goes to the Appeal Court, the judges go to a gym to exercise between court sessions. The gym trainer is Leila, a young Palestinian woman. "Gripping drama. A passionate and telling condemnation of an injustice made possible by the anti-terrorism laws." - Michael Kustow, theatre director, former Channel 4 arts commissioner Staged reading directed by Tom Platten. Box Office 020 8985 2424 Web: www.hackneyempire.co.uk Email: info@hackneyempire.co.uk Links: Location map

Final two suspects - although basically any Muslim can now be a 'suspect' - being held from anti-terror raids in north-west England released without charge. When are these bogus raids going to stop. Who is running them and using what 'intelligence'? Where does the media get it erroneous and baseless stories that always accompany these raids with lurid targeting plots about shopping centres and nightclubs?

The apparent 'student terrorist' plotters turns out, as predicted on Gaza Solidarity , to be no such thing. Nine have been released without charge - well sort of as they've now been handed over to immigration authorities with a view to deportation - and two are still being held, one British national and one Pakistani. Lawyer for three of the individuals is fighting their deportation demanding the students be allowed to complete their studies. The government says they are a threat to national security. In fact they are only a threat to the methods of repression being used by this government. There needs to be an urgent inquiry into the security forces blatantly political use of anti-terror laws to intimidate and criminalise law-abiding Muslims, along with anyone else that protests as seen in the arrest of 114 climate campers or the sinister and overtly political arrest of Viva Palestina drivers. Also the five people detained in the 'terror plot' identified, not witho...

The 'visa rules terror plot' interrogators have nothing for the security apparatus to present to an expectant media, so in the meantime how about getting that McCarthyite witch hunt of Muslims going in the universities as we seem to be making headway elsewhere. Being a Muslim in Britain gets scarier by the day. The government has recently introduced immigration rules requiring university lecturers to report any overseas student that fails to attend a lecture , seminar or tutorial or hands in essays late. WTF But if we all let this stuff stand, the state will keep coming back for more powers and more repression. There has been a recent wave of incredibly successful student occupations for Gaza as you can see further down the page. Many Muslim students, although most were non-Muslim, were involved. Is that the real target of these raids - radical political activism that challenges the government's misguided and counter-productive 'war on terror'? As it happens there w...

Channel 4 has new footage showing the baton attack on Ian Tomlinson, about 1 min into report. Ian Tomlinson's fellow Standard seller said: 'they killed him, they killed him' The police officer who made the attack above has now come forward. 10 'terror' arrests in Lancashire. Nothing like a terror raid to move the news agenda on. But to be fair this time it appears to be a fuck up. Showing secret documents to the world's press probably not sending out the right message. Of the raids themselves, in Cheetham Hill Manchester it sounded like an invasion - armed police marched down the street screaming orders, scary or what. The charges for those detained? How about reading while being a Muslim. And buried in the papers in a few months' time will be a little report pointing out that the persons arrested in that terror plot (probably given a name that encapsulate a fanciful scheme to bring mayhem to the UK) were in fact innocent, although one used the internet too ...

You would have thought by now that top cops would know when it's wise to just shut up. I say this because yesterday we were treated to the spectacle of none other than Ian Blair , former head of London's Metropolitan police (the City of London has its own police force - are far more civilised bunch altogether) telling us how misunderstood the police investigating the racist killing of Stephen Lawrence in south east London were. Well I'd hate to see what a deeply prejudiced racist and sexist police force looks like then. And in case you think Blair it out of step the new Met commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, got in his attacks on the anti-racists first with the absurd claim that there are 'only a few pockets of stupidity and bigoty left' when it comes to institutional racism in the police. A glance back over a month or so of police-related headlines throws up some problem areas for the defenders of the peace. Lets leave aside incidents such as the serial rapists th...

Terrorist organization that planned to bomb Concordia University advised Canadian government to ban MP George Galloway An organization that planned to blow up Concordia University, and that the FBI, the U.S. State Department, and U.S. courts have branded a 'terrorist organization', has given advice to the Harper government that led Immigration Minister Jason Kenney to barring a British MP from Canada. A Kenney spokesman said Kenney first heard about British MP George Galloway's visit from a Jewish Defense League (JDL) March 16 letter. The Jewish Defense League, is categorized by the FBI as a "right-wing Jewish terrorist group", founded in 1968 by ultra Zionist Meir Kahane. Kanahe then founded the terrorist group Khach in Israel. JDL leader Meir Weinstein (no relation to the author) boasts of getting the Canadian government to ban Galloway. Mr. Galloway, labeled a terrorist threat by the Conservative government, is freely touring the U.S. now. Galloway is scheduled...

To search this page using Firefox hold down control-f and a search field will appear at the bottom of the browser window allowing you to search the web page your viewing for keywords. Something similar in Internet Explorer I presume. [update 12:43 GMT+1 July 22 2010] No charges against police killers of Ian Tomlinson. Outrageous but sadly not surprising. Affirms the fact that the police have a licence to kill in the UK. See Guardian article here [update 16:31 GMT Sept 28 2009] LONDON (Reuters) - A police officer has been charged with assaulting a female protester during anti-G20 demonstrations in London earlier this year, prosecutors said on Monday. Police Sergeant Delroy Smellie is accused of beating a woman during the protests in the City of London on April 2 as the leaders of the G20 nations gathered for an economic summit. An investigation was launched by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) watchdog after video footage came to light of an officer alleg...