Forty-five British Muslim organizations, scholars and activists voiced unequivocal support for “the Palestinian right to self-defense and resistance against Israel’s illegal occupation and brutal violence.”
The statement came just days after Hamas murdered more than 1,300 Israelis in a surprise incursion over the border on Oct. 7. Many others were injured, and many remain hostages in the Gaza Strip.
The UK advocacy group Cage, which was criticized in 2013 over antisemitic materials on its site, including the suggestion that a Jew had planned to destroy the World Trade Center in Manhattan, published the letter from the 45 organizations. In 2015, the research director of the group, who also co-signed this week’s letter, called the ISIS terrorist known as Jihadi John as a “beautiful young man.”
The new statement calls for “the rejection of the term ‘terrorism’ when describing acts of Palestinian resistance and an end to the criminalization of acts of solidarity with Palestine by the UK government.”
It also calls for Palestinian prisoners to be released immediately and the “apartheid state” dismantled completely.
