Three Palestine Action activists end UK hunger strike | Israel-Palestine conflict News

Prisoners for Palestine says move comes after subsidiary of Israeli arms manufacturer failed to win UK gov’t contract.

Three detained British activists who spent weeks refusing food have ended their hunger strike, citing a report that a United Kingdom-based subsidiary of a major Israeli weapons company was denied a UK government contract.

The Prisoners for Palestine group said in a statement on Wednesday that hunger strikers Kamran Ahmed, Heba Muraisi and Lewie Chiaramello ended their strike after one of their “key” demands was achieved.

“Our prisoners’ hunger strike will be remembered as a landmark moment of pure defiance; an embarrassment for the British state,” the group said.

Several people affiliated with the proscribed group Palestine Action had refused food in UK prisons since November in protest of their detention and the British government’s support for Israel as it wages a genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza.

The activists’ relatives and friends had warned that their prolonged hunger strike put them at risk of serious health problems and even death.

The Times reported on Tuesday that Elbit Systems UK, a subsidiary of the Israeli arms manufacturer of the same name, had failed to win a $2.69bn contract to help train British soldiers.

Citing an unnamed UK Ministry of Defence “insider”, the news outlet said the department instead chose to award the contract to a rival consortium led by Raytheon UK.

“The abrupt cancellation of this deal is a resounding victory for the hunger strikers, who resisted with their incarcerated bodies to shed light on the role of Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer, in the colonisation and occupation of Palestine,” Prisoners for Palestine said.

For years, Palestinian rights activists have called on countries to divest from Elbit Systems over its role in supplying the Israeli military with weapons used in alleged war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territory.

That includes the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, where Israel’s military assault has killed more than 71,000 Palestinians since October 2023.

The Palestine Action hunger-strikers were jailed over their alleged involvement in break-ins at the UK subsidiary of Elbit Systems in Filton near Bristol in 2024.

The British government proscribed Palestine Action in June of last year under the country’s Terrorism Act 2000, making it illegal for people to join or express support for the group under penalty of up to 14 years in prison.

Since then, scores of people have been detained at protests across the UK for expressing support for the group in what critics say is a draconian crackdown on freedom of speech and assembly.

On Wednesday, Prisoners for Palestine said a total of seven activists had started to eat again after ending their hunger strikes.

British MP John McDonnell hailed the hunger strikers’ “dedication” in a social media post.

“I want to say to them, thank you for all that you’ve done,” said McDonnell, adding that the campaign “to ensure peace and justice for the Palestinian people” and to “end the complicity of the UK arms industry in the war crimes” being committed by Israel would continue.