World
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US sanctions leave Palestine Action crowdfunder blocked before supreme court challenge
The Palestine Action crowdfunder blocked from raising legal fees for the group's UK supreme court challenge was turned down by the platform CrowdJustice, which said its payment processor, the US firm Stripe, cannot support accounts or transactions linked to or for the benefit of Palestine Action. The sanctions behind the block were imposed by Donald Trump in September 2026.
By Haut Monde Post
• October 2, 2026
• 3 Min Read
Why the fundraiser was shut down
CrowdJustice, a UK crowdfunding company, turned the fundraiser away because its payment processing runs through the US firm Stripe. The money was meant to cover legal fees for the challenge to the ban at the UK supreme court.
Huda Ammori, the Palestine Action co-founder who brought the legal challenge against the UK ban, said the platform's reliance on US services had shut the group out:
Due to CrowdJustice's and other platforms' reliance on US services, we are unable to fundraise for legal fees needed for our supreme court challenge.
Stripe declined to comment, saying it does not comment on individual users. The crowdfunding site was also approached for comment.
Sanctions rooted in post-9/11 powers
Donald Trump imposed the US sanctions in September 2026, drawing on powers President George W Bush introduced in 2001. Those powers date from shortly after the 9/11 attacks by al-Qaida on the twin towers in New York.
The case the fees cannot fund
In June last year, the then home secretary, Yvette Cooper, announced her intention to ban Palestine Action under UK law, a step that placed the group alongside the likes of Islamic State and Boko Haram. Within days, a CrowdJustice fundraiser for legal fees to fight the case in the high court had raised more than £300,000.
- •The high court ruled the ban unlawful; the court of appeal overturned that decision.
- •Defending the proscription in the high court cost the Home Office £700,000, according to the Independent, and the bill will run far higher now the court of appeal has heard the case.
What Ammori and Murray say
Ammori said the state keeps spending millions of pounds to cover its legal costs of defending a ban she called disproportionate and draconian, and that more than 3,700 people have been arrested for holding signs allegedly supporting a proscribed organisation.
She accused the British government and the US of putting every possible obstacle in the group's way to stack the odds against it, said Palestine Action plainly faces harsher sanctions than Israel, and argued the powerful have banded together against citizens acting on their conscience against the Israeli war machine and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
- •If the challenge succeeds, she said, all prosecutions of protesters who held signs will be rightfully quashed.
- •If it fails, she warned, thousands of people will face jail for holding placards.
- •She called the case extremely important for free-speech rights in Britain as well as for the people of Palestine.
Craig Murray, a former British diplomat separately challenging the legality of the ban in Scotland, saw his own fundraiser on CrowdJustice for legal fees taken down after the US designated Palestine Action a global terrorist organisation. Murray called the situation disgraceful, describing the proscription as draconian legislation affecting freedom of speech, and said: "you've then got moves to cripple our ability to fight it legally through the courts, which is just adding injustice to injustice".
Ammori's supreme court challenge is due to be heard in November.
