[News] Palestine Action Strike Britain's Foreign Office and Occupy Leonardo On Balfour 106

[Anti-Imperialist News]

palestineaction.org <https://www.palestineaction.org/balfour-106/>
Palestine Action Strike Britain's Foreign Office and Occupy Leonardo On
Balfour 106November 2, 2023
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*Images and videos are available here*
<https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/bfylpoqdmgomryrb1e6up/h?rlkey=xk7z0bhz46q8j06qp379xqwap&dl=0>


Today, on the 106th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, activists
from Palestine Action targeted Britain’s foreign office and are currently
occupying the weapons firm Leonardo at their London HQ. Leonardo’s London
offices have been covered in red paint, to symbolise the Palestinian
bloodshed by their weaponry, whilst one activist remains on top of the
company’s front overhang. Elsewhere, the Foreign Office in London was
sprayed in messages including ‘Britain Guilty’ and ‘Fuck Balfour.

Written in 1917 by then UK foreign secretary, Lord Arthur Balfour, the
Declaration signed away the land of Palestine to the Zionist colonial
project – a land Britain never had the right to give away [1
<https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2018/11/2/more-than-a-century-on-the-balfour-declaration-explained>].
After the declaration, until 1948, the British burnt down indigenous
villages to prepare the way for the Nakba; with this came arbitrary
killings, arrests, torture, sexual violence including rape against women
and men, the use of human shields and the introduction of home demolitions
as collective punishment to repress Palestinian resistance [2
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/britain-palestine-balfour-colonial-crimes-reparations>]
[3 <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-63145992>].

The Nakba (‘Great Catastrophe’) saw British armed and trained Zionist
militia forcibly displace over 750,000 Palestinians, destroy over 500
Palestinian villages, and massacre many families. The genocide underway
right now in Gaza, which has already claimed the lives of over 8,500
Palestinians, injured tens of thousands more, while the 2.1m in Gaza are
starved, thirsted, and displaced, would not be happening if not for Balfour
and Britain’s ongoing political and military support for the Zionist
project.

Israel’s F-35 fighter jets, are being used in its ongoing bombardment and
massacre of Palestinians in Gaza [4
<https://inews.co.uk/news/weaponry-uk-sold-israel-f35-jets-bomb-gaza-2724324>],
using ‘high-energy military laser’ targeting systems produced by Leonardo
UK [5
<https://www.leonardo.com/en/press-release-detail/-/detail/finmeccanica-selex-es-receives-advanced-targeting-lasers-order-for-f-35>].
Leonardo furthermore supplies Israel with *Aermacchi M-346* aircraft and
components for its *Apache* attack helicopters [6
<https://www.thenational.scot/news/19322575.anger-arms-firms-get-grants-worth-nearly-10m-scottish-enterprise/>],
which have also been deployed in the violent ethnic cleansing of Gaza [7
<https://www.newsweek.com/israel-apache-helicopter-hamas-hellfire-missiles-gaza-1833372>
].

The deep military-industrial ties between Britain and Israel show that the
Balfour Declaration is not a historic document: instead, the Declaration is
the first proof of Britain’s commitment to the ethnic cleansing of the
Palestinians. This is a commitment they continue to act on, arming the
Israeli regime with the means to commit its genocide via Leonardo not least
of all.

ENDS
NOTES TO EDITORS

If you would like any further information on Palestine action, please
contactinfo at palestineaction.org

Palestine Action is a direct-action network of groups and individuals
formed with the mandate of taking action against the sites of Elbit Systems
and other companies complicit in Israeli apartheid, calling for all such
sites to be shut down.

[1]
https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2018/11/2/more-than-a-century-on-the-balfour-declaration-explained
[2]
https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/britain-palestine-balfour-colonial-crimes-reparations
[3]
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/britain-palestine-balfour-colonial-crimes-reparations>
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-63145992
<https://www.f35.com/f35/global-enterprise/united-kingdom.html>[4]
https://inews.co.uk/news/weaponry-uk-sold-israel-f35-jets-bomb-gaza-2724324
[5]
https://www.leonardo.com/en/press-release-detail/-/detail/finmeccanica-selex-es-receives-advanced-targeting-lasers-order-for-f-35
[6]
https://www.thenational.scot/news/19322575.anger-arms-firms-get-grants-worth-nearly-10m-scottish-enterprise/
[7]
https://www.newsweek.com/israel-apache-helicopter-hamas-hellfire-missiles-gaza-1833372
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