Sally Rooney to keep supporting Palestine Action, despite terror ban

Novelist Sally Rooney has reiterated her support for Palestine Action, the direct action group which is now proscribed as a terrorist organisation in the UK. She made this intervention following a protest last weekend, during which several hundred of people were arrested for holding placards which read, “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.”

In a blistering opinion piece published in the The Irish Times, Rooney writes that she intends to use her British book sales and royalties from the BBC to continue supporting Palestine Action and direct action against genocide, adding: “If the British state considers this ‘terrorism’, then perhaps it should investigate the shady organisations that continue to promote my work and fund my activities, such as WH Smith and the BBC.” The latter part of this statement may be tongue-in-cheek, but if Rooney lived in Britain, then making it would put her at risk of up to 14 years’ imprisonment.

Elsewhere in the article, Rooney argues that both Ireland and the UK are failing to uphold their legal duty under the Genocide Convention to prevent the “incomparably horrifying crime” of genocide, which Israel is carrying out in Gaza. In light of this, she believes Palestine Action deserves our gratitude and solidarity: “Activists who disrupt the flow of weapons to a genocidal regime may violate petty criminal statutes, but they uphold a far greater law and a more profound human imperative: to protect a people and culture from annihilation.” She also criticises the weaponisation of the word “terrorist”, pointing to how Israel has used the term to justify the assasination of journalist Anas al-Sharif. “Once the special word ‘terrorist’ is invoked, it seems, all laws melt into air and everything is permitted,” she writes.

Rooney has previously opposed the proscription of Palestine Action in an opinion piece for The Guardian, in which she rejected the characterisation of the group as a terrorist organisation, described the ban as “an alarming curtailment of free speech”, and lambasted the British government for its ongoing complicity in Israel’s genocide. She also submitted a written document as part of the group’s court case, stating that the ban would prevent her from speaking at future events in the UK because she “could not in good conscience disguise or lie about my principles.” 

Sally Rooney is a hugely successful and celebrated author, described as one of the world’s most influential people by Time magazine in 2022. Her stance raises some important questions, which the law is too messy to answer with certainty: Is it now illegal in Britain to say that you agree with Sally Rooney? Will she be able to travel here in the future without facing arrest? Will Keir Starmer be drawing up expedition plans, sending a SWAT team to County Mayo or compiling a watchlist of everyone spotted reading Intermezzo on the tube?