Irish author Sally Rooney has vowed to give fees generated by two BBC adaptations of her books to the Palestine Action group — banned recently in the UK as a terrorist organisation — as a government spokesperson on Monday warned anyone flouting the law risked prosecution.
The writer, whose second novel “Normal People” (2018) and its 2020 BBC television adaptation won her international acclaim, announced her plans in the Irish Times.
Rooney said she had chosen the Dublin-based newspaper to publicise her intention rather than a UK one as doing so “would now be illegal” after the government banned Palestine Action as a terrorist group in early July.
“The UK’s state broadcaster… regularly pays me residual fees. I want to be clear that I intend to use these proceeds of my work, as well as my public platform generally, to go on supporting Palestine Action and direct action against genocide in whatever way I can,” she wrote.
More than 700 people have been arrested, mostly at demonstrations, since the group was outlawed under the Terrorism Act 2000.
“I feel obliged to state once more that like the hundreds of protesters arrested last weekend, I too support Palestine Action. If this makes me a ‘supporter of terror’ under UK law, so be it’,” Rooney said.
The government ban on Palestine Action came into force on July 5, days after it took responsibility for a break-in at an air force base in southern England that caused an estimated GBP7.0 million ($9.3 million) of damage to two aircraft.
The group said its activists were responding to Britain’s indirect military support for Israel during the war in Gaza.
Being a member of Palestine Action or supporting the group is now a criminal offence in Britain, punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
More than 500 people were arrested at a protest in London’s Parliament Square on August 9 for displaying placards backing the group.
The number is thought to be the highest-ever recorded number of detentions at a single protest in the capital.
At least 60 of them are due to face prosecution, police said.
Britain’s interior minister Yvette Cooper has defended the Labour government’s proscription of the group, stating that “UK national security and public safety must always be our top priority”.
“The assessments are very clear — this is not a non-violent organisation,” she said.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s official spokesperson declined to be drawn specifically on Rooney’s comments.
But the spokesperson added: “Support for a proscribed organisation is an offence under the Terrorism Act and obviously the police will… implement the law.”
Jilan Wahba Abdalmajid, the ambassador of the state of Palestine in Ireland, praised Rooney for “using her voice to call out international law and human rights violations in Palestine”.
“I hope these calls result in practical actions that will stop the horrors we’re witnessing carried out by Israel in Palestine; to stop the genocide and forced displacement and end the Israeli occupation,” she said.
Ireland confirmed the appointment of a full Palestinian ambassador last November after Dublin formally recognised a Palestinian state earlier in 2024.
AFP
