A British pro-Palestinian Arab activist admitted in court Thursday that she and fellow members of Palestine Action intended to inflict maximum property damage during a raid on Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems UK, but insisted she opposed violence, Reuters reported.
Charlotte Head, 29, and five others are standing trial at Woolwich Crown Court over what prosecutors described as a meticulously planned assault on Elbit’s Bristol facility in southwest England last August.
All six face charges of aggravated burglary, violent disorder, and criminal damage. One defendant, Samuel Corner, 23, is additionally accused of grievous bodily harm with intent after allegedly striking a female police sergeant with a sledgehammer, fracturing her lumbar spine.
Head told jurors the group acted because “all else had failed.” She admitted driving a repurposed prison van through fences and into a loading bay in the early hours of August 6, 2024, carrying fellow activists. Their plan, she said, was to “go in and destroy as many weapons as we could find.”
Asked by her lawyer Rajiv Menon whether she used violence against guards or police, Head replied: “No, never.” She further testified that she only became involved in pro-Palestinian Arab activism after Hamas attacked Israel from Gaza on October 7, 2023. She described Israel’s military response to the massacre as a “genocide”.
Head, pressed on whether she would have joined the action had she known violence would occur, answered, “No, it was not a part of the plan.”
British police recently released footage from the Palestine Action raid on the Elbit factory.
The British government proscribed Palestine Action as a terrorist organization last July, days after its activists protesting the Gaza war broke into an air force base in southern England, causing an estimated £7 million in damage to two aircraft.
Palestine Action has challenged the ban in court.
Founded in 2020, Palestine Action describes itself as a “direct action” network opposing what it calls British “complicity” with Israel, particularly in relation to arms sales.
The group also previously defaced a painting of Lord Balfour at Trinity College Cambridge, spraying the portrait with red paint and slashing it.
In another incident, Palestine Action members stole two busts of Israel’s first President, Chaim Weizmann, from a glass cabinet at Manchester University.