Things seem to be changing with some tentative hopes for the future. The Israeli elections denied Netanyahu a majority and negotiations are underway to form some kind of coalition. The Arab parties did well and may have some kind of decisive influence on the result.
In America, President Trump and the Republicans received what some are calling a rout and both Congress and the Senate will have Democratic majorities. This will put some curbs on the President’s ability to act but he is still free to pursue foreign adventures.
Perhaps the biggest surprise in the week was the announcement that the US is ending its aid to Israel at the end of this year. President Trump said ‘they don’t need it’ as they were now a ‘successful country’. He said this had been discussed and agreed with Netanyahu at his recent visit to the White House. This aid amounts to $3.3bn annually and has enabled the state to become a regional defence superpower. The argument now is that they have developed significant defence capabilities so are no longer in need of the aid. In a decade they have received $38bn.
Vigil
Around 30 turned out for the vigil (pictured). Another key event which took place last week was the Supreme Court appeal concerning Palestine Action. They were declared to be a terrorist organisation by Yvette Cooper when she was Home Secretary partly because they were lumped in with some unpleasant organisations, Maniacs Murder Cult and the Russian Imperial Movement. There are reports that many Labour MPs are expressing misgivings about the decision and how they were obliged, and whipped, to support it. There is no question that the violence members committed at the Elbit Systems factory was deplorable and the attack on the police officer indefensible. But the question is: does this make them a terrorist organisation? Amnesty, Liberty and others think not. The Court is deliberating its decision now.
The future of Israeli politics looks uncertain at this moment with no party achieving a secure majority and with the ‘Arab’ parties doing well becoming in effect the king makers. Neither likely winner: Netanyahu nor Eisenkot, are representing real change in the political landscape. Watching the interviews in Israel with people in the street is often quite depressing. Like Trump, many seem to see Netanyahu as the future despite the pitiful state he has left the nation in.
The Times of Israel reports today that a renewed strike on Iran is being discussed with the US.
This week’s Salisbury vigil was well attended with around 30 of us there. Recognition was good partly because it is now dusk with the change in the clocks so people notice the candles. As ever, we report no sign of the local MP Mr John Glen who is member of the Friends of Israel organisation.
According to Arab News, the death toll in Gaza (two weeks ago) was 74,396 and injuries are over 175,000.
Video Because …
We are pleased to report our YouTube video Because ... has been viewed hundreds of times and can be seen here. We shall be there near the Library next Saturday 7th November at 5pm as usual.
After the strong turnout for vigil 150, the storm meant few braved last evening’s vigil as we sheltered on the steps of the Library. We are pleased to note that the previous week’s vigil attracted some coverage in the Salisbury Journal both on line and in the print version.
On Friday 23rd, Channel 4 News had an extended package on the violence in the West Bank which has been growing in intensity and frequency [registration may be required]. It showed dead goats killed by settler gangs and the camera crew and reporter were themselves attacked. It is the time of the olive harvest and settlers are attacking pickers and the trees themselves. IDF soldiers do little to prevent these attacks. There is footage of Palestinian houses being demolished. Data for the number of attacks is provided by the Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din which gives copious information about how little is done to bring perpetrators to justice.
The UK’s support for violence in the Middle East with the supply of weapons is well-aired on these pages. They are also keen to stifle support for Palestine Action and over 3,000 have now been arrested for so doing. The author Sally Rooney has been caught up in the dispute and her books can no longer be sold in the UK as this risks arrest. Palestine Action say:
“The ban on Palestine Action was only introduced to serve the interests of the Israel lobby and the Israeli arms industry at the expense of the fundamental freedoms of British citizens.
“Andy Burnham’s Government has the power to overturn this authoritarian ban, but they are choosing instead to defend it in the Supreme Court” [accessed 25 October].
Sarah Helm
A writer and journalist Sarah Helm has also been caught up in what is almost an hysterical response by a range of right wing and Israeli supporting news organisations. Sarah is the wife of Jonathan Powell who is the government’s national security adviser. She responded on X to a clip of broadcaster Adam Boulton criticising fellow writer Sally Rooney over her support for the pro-Palestinian movement. She wrote “God help us authors who support Palestine and Palestine Action. Sounds like Adam [Boulton] would have all our books swept off the shelves in a jiffy.”
The post has drawn attention because Palestine Action was proscribed as a terrorist organisation in the UK in July 2025, making membership and certain forms of support for the group criminal offences under the Terrorism Act 2000. The effect of this decision is increasingly being seen as an attack on free speech. An appeal will be heard in the Supreme Court soon.
The police have decided to take no action as her words do not pass the required threshold. The Campaign Against Antisemitism has been especially vocal against Ms Helm. The organisation was founded by Gideon Falter.
It almost doesn’t seem possible that a group of people in Salisbury have turned out each Saturday for 150 weeks to stand, sometimes in the cold and rain, to support the principle of peace and justice in the Middle East. Yesterday (17th) there were 40 of us and it should be emphasised that although there are stalwart members who come more of less every week, there are others who come a few times and there are passers-by who join in a well. Not seen at any of the 150 vigils over three years is the local MP Mr John Glen. He is a supporter of Conservative Friends of Israel.
Israel continues to dominate the news last week. First the film NAZA which has achieved considerable international recognition and success being viewed by millions around the world. It has generated a fierce response from Israel and the IDF who accuse the soldiers who were interviewed as ‘smearing’ Israel and ‘causing harm to Israel’s diplomatic and security interests’. They both deny its integrity yet say it is a threat.
Sally Rooney the Irish novelist, has had to remove all her books from sale in the UK because she risks falling foul of the terrorist laws because of her support for Palestine Action. Any royalties from those sales risk being classed as ‘proceeds of terrorism’ and she risks a prison sentence. This is a direct attack on free speech and comment. Curiously, various organisations which promote violent action are not proscribed by the government such is their obsession with supporting Israel and the arms deals. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, thought to be behind some recent incidents such as Fairford for example, is not proscribed.
The third event of last week was the attack by settlers on a group of diplomats from France, Belgium and Poland visiting the West Bank. They had also attacked Palestinians trying to harvest their olives beating one man badly. They also attacked a Washington Post photographer Heidi Levine.
Our film Because … was published last week and we are pleased to report a good level of interest so far.
Main photo: Salisbury Amnesty, other photos courtesy of Peter Gloyns
Today, 17th October, is the 150th vigil in Salisbury. If you are able to come that would be wonderful. You may wonder why you haven’t heard of this and we are disappointed to report that the Salisbury Journal declined to publish the press notice. We cannot know why. 5 o’clock outside the Library for half and hour.
The film NAZA was shown in cinemas around the country yesterday and following the showing there was an interview with the makers and others involved. NAZA is the word used by the IDF to assess collateral deaths in pursuit of one Hamas operative. It is short for Nezek agavi in Hebrew meaning collateral damage. The film – a documentary – is unusual in many respects. It is shot almost completely at night in Tel Aviv on the roof of an apartment block. There are 24 interviews with IDF personnel of various ranks whose identities are concealed. There were no interviews with journalists or politicians, simply the IDF people. The interviews were not interspersed with Gaza footage which came at the end showing the distress of one man in particular whose wife and children were buried after a strike. They were interspersed with views of Israelis living ordinary lives in the flats opposite, a kind of counterpoint to the narratives we were listening to.
The interviewees explained the reasoning behind the word and what it means in practice. The Israelis have almost complete control of the mobile phone network and are able to track and listen in to conversations of Hamas people and others in the strip. Having identified a target the question then is how to kill them, where they are now or wait until they are home. At home, the problem then becomes the level of collateral deaths of family members, including children, and everyone else living in the block. Estimates are made and the NAZA might in fact be around 200 or more. The block is then bombed killing everyone living in it.
It is clear that the level of civilian, non combatant deaths is known before a strike. We are not therefore talking about a one-off incidence of accidental mishap which will happen in any war, but a deliberate policy where the likely level of killing is known beforehand.
Various bodies, including the UN, Amnesty International, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights – the latter two of which are Israeli based – have said Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The film won the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival and there was a 25 minute standing ovation. It was produced by the Guardian.
‘Human shield’ and other claims
It is also clear that frequent claims by Netanyahu and others that every effort is made to limit civilian casualties is utterly untrue. Further, the claims that Hamas ‘use human shields’ is untrue. We saw clips of both statements being made by Netanyahu. These claims are clearly and unequivocally refuted by the testimonies made in the documentary. They have however been endlessly repeated in British media outlets such that it has left a lasting impression of heartless and ruthless Hamas terrorists lining up Palestinians for slaughter. The death toll of 73,000 is therefore the fault of Hamas.
NAZA became a kind of euphemism: they [IDF soldiers] would say ‘NAZA 200’ as a means of saying two hundred would be killed to kill one Hamas person. A chilling detail was the ability of the Israelis to listen to mobile phone conversations and if they picked up a child saying ‘Daddy’s home’ (or similar) it would be a trigger for a strike.
The soldiers
The soldiers had obviously become troubled by the wanton killing and being participants in what were clearly war crimes. They joined up after the terrible events of October 7th but became disillusioned. This led to them taking the risk of speaking to the film makers. They were troubled at the scale of killing and how depersonalised and dehumanising it was. Buttons were pressed and an entire block of flats, full of people, would be flattened by a massive bomb.
Considerable efforts were made to check the narratives and the soldier’s accounts. Around another hundred sources were spoken to in an effort to check facts.
Israeli response
The response has been fierce and according to one of the producers Jonathan Glazer, ‘more venal than expected’. IDF has produced a ten page rebuttal basically denying every aspect of the film.
They have also produced their own film which mimics the actual one [we were unable to locate this on YouTube. We may add it in a later amendment]. They have called for the two film makers to have their Israeli citizenship annulled. Their parents have faced death threats in Israel.
While claiming the film is, to quote the Times of Israel ‘Distorted, misleading and disingenuous‘, the government has accused them of exposing state secrets. They report a major effort is underway to locate the speakers.
Comments
This is a powerful documentary exposing the mechanism of Israel’s military activities in Gaza. There is no doubt that war crimes have been committed on a massive scale. No attempt was made by the documentary makers to draw wider conclusions beyond the testimony of the 24 interviewees, which gives it its power.
The film is, and will be, shown around the world and this will be of concern to the Israeli government. The usual and knee-jerk attack line of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel is harder to demonstrate when everyone interviewed and the film makers themselves are all Jewish.
It throws a spotlight on the support offered by the US and the UK governments to Israel. Both have been willing participants in their support – overt and covert – to them in effect becoming participants in a killing machine. We continue to supply arms and to allow the Israeli defence firm Elbit Systems to operate in the UK. It also throws a spotlight on the 150 or so members of parliament who are members of one of the Friends of Israel groups the most heavily funded lobby group in Westminster. Are they happy with their continuing support? The Salisbury MP Mr John Glen is a ‘proud member’ of the Conservative version of this organisation. All are shamed.
It is to be hoped it will have a lasting impact certainly in the West.
The 149th vigil held on Saturday. Big row about the Green party motion on Zionism
October 2026
A tense week on the Israel front with a major row erupting at the Green party conference arising from a motion to defining Zionism as “a political ideology which called for the creation – and, now it exists, the continuity – of an ethnonationalist Jewish State in historic Palestine to the exclusion and/or domination of the non-Jewish population.” It has put the party leader Zac Polanski in a difficult position partly because he was absent for the vote itself.
The death toll continues in Gaza with 74,243 deaths and 1,460 killed since the ‘cease fire’. There are 175,243 wounded many of whom are children who have suffered severe physical injuries and who have lost family members. Some have experienced mental trauma which will last a lifetime. It is ironic listening to the earnest debates and interviews about the Green party motion, to note that there is no equivalent earnest debate about this death toll. It has just become so much background noise.
We held our 149th vigil on Saturday with around 25 present. Next Saturday 17th, will be the 150th such vigil. We had no notion they would continue this long. The local MP, Mr John Glen has never appeared at a single vigil nor mentioned their existence in his weekly column courtesy of the Salisbury Journal. He is a member of the Conservative Friends of Israel lobbying organisation.
The film NAZA is being shown in the Odeon in Salisbury on Thursday 15th. This is the award winning film made secretly in Israel at night. The resulting documentary, “NAZA,” takes a look at the technology used by Israel in Gaza to identify military targets. Anonymous sources in the film said the technology also has been used to kill Palestinian civilians. A trailer can be seen here.
We are pleased to attach the minutes of the last meeting thanks to group member Lesley for preparing them and thanks to group members for their contributions. Rather longer than ordinary minutes, they contain reports on the death penalty, the situation with refugees and immigrants, statistics and a report on the state of rights in the UK a sad addition to what we report on.
Because … is now published. Next week will be the 150th vigil
October 2026
We are pleased to announce the publication of our video Because ... in which some participants of the vigils we have held every Saturday since the horrific events of October 7th and the aftermath, give their reasons for attending. This coming Saturday 17th, will be our 150th such vigil. We hope you will watch it and perhaps share it.
We are pleased to attach the latest death penalty report for mid September to mid October thanks to group member Lesley for the work in compiling it. This month the failed execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee has led to international outrage. After two failed attempts to execute her she was found still to be alive and was rushed to hospital where it is reported she is still alive.
The governor of Florida continues with his drive to execute people making it the record state in the US.
We are pleased to report the release of Jagtar Singh-Johal on bail after being held in prison for 9 years.
As ever we must note that we have no reports from China which is believed to execute more of its citizens than the rest of the world combined but where details are a state secret.
