Pro-Palestine activists target another factory in UK for ties with Israel

By Burak Bir

LONDON (AA) - Activists from the UK-based Palestine Action network "occupied" a US-owned Teledyne factory in West Yorkshire in the UK on Tuesday because it is "producing components" for the Israeli military.

Footage from the group showed that an activist, who climbed onto the roof, damaging it with a hammer and chanting: "For the forced starvation, for the genocide, for the gang rape of women, for the bombing of churches, for the bombing of mosques."

Separate footage showed another activist breaking the windows and damaging the roof of the Teledyne Defence and Space's site.

Protesters later unfurled a Palestinian flag and chanted, "Free Palestine" on the roof.

"Breaching security, the activists have scaled the factory to take the roof, forcing the site closed and rendering it unable to fulfil its shipment of weapons parts to be used in the Gaza genocide," the group said in a statement.

The site was granted at least 86 licenses for the export of weapons to Israel from 2009 to 2014, said Palestine Action, noting that by volume of licenses granted, Teledyne is the largest exporter of weaponry from the UK to Israel.

"A significant proportion of the company’s almost 200 export licenses for weapons and weapons parts to the US, 2009-2020, will also form into finished products ultimately exported to Israel," it said.

The statement noted that Teledyne produces parts, including filters and multi-function assemblies, for UAVs, aircraft and radar systems, including the AN/APG-81 (AESA) type fitted in Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets.

"Teledyne, the parent company, also produces image sensors for military applications and radar technologies around the borders of the occupied West Bank and Gaza while also providing armed UAVs to Israel as far back as 1973," it added.

This is not the first time Palestine Action has struck a Teledyne site. It dismantled the Presteigne, Wales, Teledyne Labtech factory in 2022, causing £1 million ($1.3 million) in losses.

Israel has waged a deadly military offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 cross-border attack by the Palestinian group, Hamas, which killed less than 1,200 people.

More than 32,800 Palestinians have since been killed and 75,300 injured amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities.

Israel has also imposed a crippling blockade on the Gaza Strip, leaving its population, particularly residents of northern Gaza, on the verge of starvation.

The Israeli war has pushed 85% of Gaza’s population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which Thursday asked it to do more to prevent famine in Gaza.