[News] Palestine Action Scotland Occupy Thales Weapons Factory In Glasgow

[Anti-Imperialist News]

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Palestine Action Scotland Occupy Thales Weapons Factory In Glasgow
By Palestine Action - June 5, 2022
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Above Photo: Guy Smallman.
Marking the launch of Palestine Action Scotland, six activists have stormed
and occupied the roof of arms company Thales’ Glasgow factory.

*Activists scaled the roof in the early hours of the morning, halting site
operations as workers were forced to evacuate. Factory equipment has also
been destroyed by the activists.*

This morning, Palestine Action Scotland made its debut – as activists took
to the roof of weapons company Thales’ Glasgow factory. A team of six
activists scaled the site in the early hours of the morning and are
currently occupying the building, rendering it unusable and forcing workers
to evacuate. Inside the factory they have dismantled and destroyed factory
equipment and facilities.

Thales is one of the world’s largest arms companies – producing armored
vehicles, missile systems and military UAVs (drones) – in particular, the
Watchkeeper drone, used for surveillance and combat on captive populations.
Today’s action has begun the campaign to end Scottish complicity in the
apartheid, dispossession and ethnic cleansing enacted on Palestinians by
the Israeli occupation.

Thales operates under the same banner as Elbit – Israel’s largest weapons
company, with the two cooperating on the Watchkeeper UAV project, which
Elbit’s UAV Tactical Systems site in Leicester is directly involved
in. Elbit’s Hermes 450 drone, which has been used extensively in attacks on
Gaza’s captive population, laid the foundations for the Watchkeeper
project. The Watchkeeper drone has clocked thousands of hours of operations
in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has a persistent presence over the skies of
Gaza.

Closer to home, in 2020, Thales were contracted by the Royal Navy to aid in
the new ‘Dreadnought’ class nuclear submarine program. Furthermore, the UK
Border Force began use of the Watchkeeper drone in 2020, monitoring British
waters.

Using the tried and tested tactics in of direct action – disruptions,
occupations and blockades – the group hopes to build on the success of
parent group Palestine Action, and its ongoing campaign across England and
Wales to ‘Shut Elbit Down’. Palestine Action Scotland have joined the
evergrowing mass movement to stop all those complicit in the apartheid and
occupation in Palestine.
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