Charges against Israeli war crimes protesters dropped

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has dropped charges against nine activists who occupied the roof of an Elbit Systems factory in Staffordshire during Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip last year.

The collapse of the case came as the defence company “refused to hand over evidence about its exports of weaponry to Israel.”

The protesters from London Palestine Action had been facing charges of aggravated trespass after shutting down UAV Engines Ltd. (UEL), an Elbit subsidiary, for two days 5-6 August 2014.

But charges were dropped by the CPS “just hours before a deadline expired to provide the defendants with details of arms export licences granted to UEL to send its hi-tech engines to Israel for use in the Hermes 450 – a drone widely deployed by the Israeli military.”

According to a report in The Independent, two witnesses from the company declared that they were “no longer prepared to give evidence, and that documentation – understood to be the arms export data – would not be forthcoming.”

A statement from London Palestine Action accused the UK government and Elbit Systems of “running scared from a court case that would have put their collusion with Israeli war crimes on trial.”

The statement added: “The activists pleaded not guilty to charges of ‘preventing lawful activity’ on the basis that the operations at the Staffordshire factory were aiding and abetting war crimes and therefore illegal.”

Lawyers for the defendants say it appears the case collapsed either because the prosecution had been told either that Elbit Systems were unwilling to testify in court about their activities or because the UK government was unwilling to comply with the court’s order to disclose information it holds about licenses for arms exports to Israel, or both.