Police in several British cities on Saturday arrested scores of people for supporting Palestine Action, following a second consecutive weekend of protests over the government’s decision to ban the activist group using anti-terror laws.Campaign group Defend Our Juries, which had announced the rallies “to defy” the ban, said 86 people had been arrested across five different cities.They included four vicars, a lawyer, a civil servant, a social worker, a mechanical engineer and the daughter of a Polish resistance fighter, as well as veterans of the 1960s civil rights movement, the group added.”We will not be deterred from opposing genocide, nor from defending those who refuse to be bystanders,” the group said in a statement, referring to accusations levelled against Israel over its war in Gaza.The protesters were also taking a stand “against the corruption of democracy and the rule of law”, it added.In London, the Metropolitan Police said its officers had made 41 arrests for “showing support for a proscribed organisation”. Another person was arrested for common assault, the force added.Footage showed police moving in on a small group of protesters displaying signs supporting Palestine Action. They had gathered at lunchtime at the steps of the Mahatma Gandhi statue in Parliament Square.Greater Manchester Police arrested 16 people, while officers in the Welsh capital Cardiff detained 13, all for the same offence under the 2000 Terrorism Act, both forces confirmed.”South Wales Police supports the right for people to make their voices heard through protest providing it is done lawfully,” said a police statement.- Support now a crime -The other arrests occurred in the Northern Irish city Londonderry — also known as Derry — and Leeds, in northern England, according to Defend Our Juries.They come a week after 29 similar arrests at protests staged last Saturday, mainly in London.Since the Palestine Action ban kicked in on July 5, police have warned that expressing support for the group was now a crime, after a last-ditch High Court challenge failed to stop its proscription becoming law.The government announced plans for the ban under the 2000 Terrorism Act days after the group’s activists claimed to be behind a break-in at an air force base in southern England.Two aircraft there were sprayed with red paint, causing an estimated £7 million ($9.55 million) in damage.Four people charged in relation to the incident remain in custody.Palestine Action has condemned its outlawing — which makes it a criminal offence to belong to or support the group, punishable by up to 14 years in prison — as an attack on free speech.

Southeast Turkey, where the army has battled Kurdish militants for decades, is not yet convinced that lasting peace is at hand.In a slickly managed ceremony across the border in Iraq Friday, members of the Kurdish rebel group PKK destroyed their weapons as part of a peace process underway with the Turkish state.But on the streets and in the tea houses of Hakkari, a Kurdish-majority town some 50 kilometres (31 miles) from the Iraqi border, few people express much hope that the deadly conflict is over.Police, including undercover officers, patrol the streets of the small town and make their presence felt, an AFP team observed, which discouraged locals from wanting to talk to visiting reporters.One tea drinker who was willing to speak asked not to be filmed.”We don’t talk about it because we never know what will happen tomorrow,” he explained.”We can say something now and tomorrow be punished for it,” he added, noting that previous peace attempts have failed. The conflict has caused 50,000 deaths among civilians and 2,000 among soldiers, according to Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.- ‘All kinds of persecution’ -On the pavement in front of the restaurant where he works, Mehmet Duman raised his eyebrows. At 26, he’s already seen enough to make him doubt.”They segregated us, beat us, simply because we’re Kurdish,” he said. “We witnessed all kinds of persecution.”So from now on, if the state wants a future for Turkey — if they want Turkey to be a good environment for everyone — they must stop all this,” he said. “The state must also take a step” to match the symbolic operation to destroy PKK weapons in Iraq.”Turkey has won,” Erdogan said Saturday, a day after the PKK’s symbolic destruction of weapons signalling the start of the disarmament process.”Eighty-six million citizens have won,” he added.While he has opened a peace process with the PKK, or Kurdistan Workers’ Party, he has also continued his crackdown on opposition parties.The government has arrested hundreds of members of the CHP, a social-democratic, secular party descended from Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of the Turkish Republic. The main opposition force to Erdogan, it is rising in the polls.”Since the beginning of the peace process, Turkey has become a much more authoritarian country,” said political analyst Berk Esen.”The disarmament of a terrorist organization should, or could, lead to democratization and social peace, but it probably won’t.”- Crackdown on opposition -Those arrested include the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu, the party’s likely candidate in the next presidential elections, and the mayors of other major cities who took power when CHP made major gains in March 2024 local elections.Accused of “corruption”, they deny the charges against them.The crackdown has also hit opposition media outlets, such as the Sozcu channel. It was forced into silence after 16 fines and suspensions since January — “one every two weeks”, its director, Ozgur Cakmakci, noted Tuesday evening as lights went out.”There is little doubt that there is an intention to liquidate opposition channels as part of an authoritarian project,” said Erol Onderoglu, the Turkish representative of Reporters Without Borders.On Saturday morning, before the plenary session of his AKP party, Erdogan sought to be reassuring.”We know what we are doing. No one should worry, be afraid, or question anything. Everything we are doing is for Turkey, for our future and our independence,” he insisted.

Gaza ceasefire talks hung in the balance as Hamas and Israel on Saturday accused the other of blocking attempts to strike a deal, nearly a week into an attempt to halt 21 months of bitter fighting in the Palestinian territory.A Palestinian source with knowledge of the indirect talks in Qatar told AFP that Israel’s proposals to keep its troops in the war-torn territory were holding up a deal for a 60-day pause.But on the Israeli side, a senior political official, also speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivities of the talks, accused the militants of inflexibility and deliberately trying to scuttle an accord.On the ground, Gaza’s civil defence agency said at least 38 people were killed across the territory on Saturday, including in an overnight air strike on an area sheltering the displaced.”While we were sleeping, there was an explosion… where two boys, a girl and their mother were staying,” Bassam Hamdan told AFP after the attack in an area of Gaza City.”We found them torn to pieces, their remains scattered,” he added.In southern Gaza, bodies covered in white plastic sheets were brought to the Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis while wounded in Rafah were taken for treatment by donkey cart, on stretchers or carried.In Tel Aviv, thousands took to the streets urging the government to seal a hostage release deal. “The window of opportunity… is open now and it won’t be for long,” said Eli Sharabi, who was freed in February.Both Hamas and Israel have said that 10 hostages held since the militants’ October 7, 2023 attack that sparked the war would be released — if an agreement is reached.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was prepared then to enter talks for a more permanent end to hostilities.- Enclave plans? – But one Palestinian source said Israel’s refusal to accept Hamas’s demand for a complete withdrawal of troops from Gaza was holding back progress in the talks.A second source said mediators had asked both sides to postpone discussions until US President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, arrives in the Qatari capital.The first source said Israel was proposing to maintain its military in more than 40 percent of the Palestinian territory, forcing hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians into a small area near the city of Rafah, on the border with Egypt.”Hamas’s delegation will not accept the Israeli maps… as they essentially legitimise the reoccupation of approximately half of the Gaza Strip and turn Gaza into isolated zones with no crossings or freedom of movement,” they said.Israeli media reported that new maps would be presented on Sunday, quoting an unnamed foreign official with knowledge of the details.A senior Israeli political official countered later that it was Hamas that rejected what was on the table, accusing the group of “creating obstacles” and “refusing to compromise” with the aim of “sabotaging the negotiations”.”Israel has demonstrated a willingness to show flexibility in the negotiations, while Hamas remains intransigent, clinging to positions that prevent the mediators from advancing an agreement,” the official added in a statement sent to AFP.The Hamas attacks on Israel in 2023 resulted in the deaths of at least 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.Of the 251 hostages seized, 49 are still being held, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead. At least 57,882 Palestinians, also mostly civilians, have been killed since the start of the war, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.- Military operations – The Israeli military said on Saturday it had attacked “approximately 250 terrorist targets throughout the Gaza Strip” in the previous 48 hours. It said fighter jets hit “over 35 Hamas terror targets” around Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza.Two previous ceasefires — a week-long truce beginning in late November 2023 and a two-month one from mid-January this year — saw 105 hostages released in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.The second Palestinian source said “some progress” had been made in the latest talks on plans for releasing Palestinian prisoners held by Israel and getting more aid to Gaza.Netanyahu, who is under domestic and international pressure to end the war, said this week that neutralising Hamas as a security threat was a prerequisite for any long-term ceasefire talks.That included disarmament, he said, warning that failure to do so would mean Israel would have to do so by force.bur-az-dsm-phz/ysm