LONDON—One of the women accused of displaying paraglider images to show her support for Hamas at a pro-Palestine march in central London last year told police she thought it was a symbol which represented “liberation and peace.”
Heba Alhayek, 29, Pauline Ankunda, 26, and Noimutu Olayinka Taiwo, 27, have gone on trial at Westminster magistrates court, where they deny carrying or displaying an article to arouse reasonable suspicion they are supporters of banned organisation Hamas, at a march through Whitehall on Oct. 14, 2023.
Hamas used paragliders as part of its Oct. 7 attacks across the Israeli border, in which 1,200 civilians and military personnel were killed.
Prosecutor Brett Weaver told the court Ms. Alhayek and Ms. Ankunda were identified as being the two women seen on a video on social media during the march displaying the images on their backs while Ms. Taiwo was carrying a placard which had the same image attached to it.
Pair Initially Denied Putting Images on Themselves
Mr. Weaver told the court on Monday, Ms. Alhayek and Ms. Ankunda handed themselves into Croydon police station on Oct. 30 but initially offered prepared statements in which they claimed someone else on the march had attached the images to their backs without their knowledge. They later admitted they had attached the images themselves but denied it meant they supported Hamas or the attacks on Oct. 7.He said Ms. Taiwo was only identified and arrested on Nov. 8 when police forced entry at her home after she refused to open the door.
Mr. Weaver said she also submitted a prepared statement in which she denied supporting Hamas and said, “she had been handed a placard while on the march and took no notice of what she thought was a blurred image, although she thought it was an image of liberation and peace.”
District Judge Tan Ikram intervened in the proceedings to clarify that all three women now admit they were displaying the images and he said the question was simply whether a “reasonable” person would have thought that, by doing so, they were supporting Hamas.
The prosecution’s only witness was Detective Sergeant Michael Beskine, who led the investigation and explained how his team tracked down the women and interviewed them.
He was then cross-examined by Mark Summers, KC, the barrister representing Ms. Alhayek and Ms. Ankunda.
Mr. Summers asked him a stream of questions about the population of Gaza, the political situation, unemployment levels, culture and literature and even the quality of drinking water in the strip.
Det. Sgt. Beskine admitted he was not an expert on Gaza and said he had simply been tasked by a senior officer to find and arrest the women who had been wearing the image.
Mr. Summers asked him if he had spoken to anyone on the march about what the paraglider image meant or sought to find any experts on Palestinian culture. He admitted he had not.
The defence barrister then said the image of the two women wearing the paraglider stickers had first been shared by a Twitter page called Hurryupharry, which he described as a “right-wing American website” which was, “anti-Palestinian.”
Police Witness Says Image’s Meaning was ‘Obvious’
Det. Sgt. Beskine denied this was the case and later said it was “obvious” in the context of the march what the image signified.The defence then called their first witness, Victoria Brittain, a former associate foreign editor with The Guardian, who is also a trustee of the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign.
Ms. Brittain, 81, said she had been to Gaza twice and also to the occupied West Bank many times.
Mr. Summers then asked her the purpose of the march on Oct. 14, 2023, and she said: “Outrage about what was happening in Gaza. For a week people had been bombed and the plight of the Palestinians and the killing of Palestinians and it was an effort to pressure our government to change our policy.”
Ms. Brittain said it was “ridiculous” to consider the march pro-Hamas and she said it was “peaceful” and the atmosphere was “happy, because we thought we were doing something to change things.”
She was then asked in great detail about Palestinian culture, especially in Gaza, and the artworks of Banksy, who visited the territory in 2015 and drew a number of images, including one of children holding a balloon and floating over the wall separating Gaza and Israel.
A second witness for the defence was Sven Kuhn von Burgsdorff, a German diplomat and former European Union envoy to the Palestinians up until July 2023, who said Gaza was, “the world’s largest open-air prison.”
Von Burgsdorff, a former paratrooper in the German federal army, confirmed he performed a paragliding “stunt” in July 2023, just before he left his post.
He said it was a “symbolic gesture” to show how young Gazans aspired to fly and be free.
In his closing speech, Mr. Weaver said the context was crucial and he pointed out the video showed the defendants displaying the paraglider images as the marchers chanted, “England is a terror state, Israel is a terror state.”
Mr. Summers says the crucial point in the case was that a reasonable person was someone who was, “objective, informed” and also “unbiased.”
He also said the images were in fact of a parachutist, not a paraglider, and he said the parachute was a symbol of freedom.
Mr. Summers told the judge, “What has happened here is that the police have taken a narrative that was fed to them and brought it blindly to your door.”
Judge Ikram said he would give a written ruling in the case on Tuesday.
