JAMES BIRMINGHAM JOINS SIMON AND JON FOR A TRANSATLANTIC SHOW TO KICK OFF 2026 ~ US bellicosity in Venezuela and Greenland has shocked the world with what has been a naked display of gangster tactics in the first instance, and a seeming disdain for Nato in the second – and just today it has announced withdrawal from 66 international organisations. The shooting in Minneapolis of Renee Good meanwhile has been kicking off protests nationwide. Back in Blighty, the Filton Palestine solidarity hunger strike has seen one of the hunger strikers, Teuta Hoxha, forced to stop amid fears she has suffered irreversible damage to her body, while Kamran Ahmed was admitted to hospital for the sixth time yesterday and his immediate family notified. The hunger strikers are between 50 and 70 days in, which is the same range that killed Bobby Sands. In London, a recent FT story has gone into a bit of detail over a proposed data centre at the Truman Brewery on Brick Lane. And last but not least, Freedom has published an exclusive interview with Iranian group the Anarchist Front about the uprising which is taking place there  The post Anarchist News Review: The US gets aggressive while the UK sits around appeared first on Freedom News.

EXCESSIVE POLICING OF PENTONVILLE DEMO IN SOLIDARITY WITH PALESTINE ACTION HUNGER STRIKERS ~ Blade Runner ~ The traditional anarchist New Year’s Eve gathering outside HMP Pentonville was joined on December 31, 2025 by a solidarity demonstration for remand prisoners currently on hunger strike, organised by Palestine Pulse alongside other grassroots groups. Hundreds of people assembled on Caledonian Road carrying Palestinian flags and banners, with the demonstration centred on solidarity with prisoners rather than disruption. Nevertheless, police responded with a large and visibly disproportionate deployment. Protesters counted at least 21 police vans in the immediate area, equating to roughly 170 officers. Many were deployed in boiler suits and carrying long batons, signalling a preparedness for confrontation rather than assembly facilitation. Despite the heavy police presence, passing drivers repeatedly sounded their horns in support of the demonstration. Officers attempted to confine protesters behind railings on a narrow stretch of pavement, but as numbers grew this quickly became untenable. Protesters spilled onto the road and began a spontaneous march around the prison block, entering Wheelwright Street. Police reinforcements arrived as officers moved to block surrounding streets, fragmenting movement and preventing the crowd from circulating freely. > The march was halted and forced back towards Caledonian Road. Further attempts > to move south were blocked by additional cordons, leaving protesters penned-in > on the carriageway. The aggressive policing approach generated predictable > friction, resulting in minor injuries and two arrests, both reportedly > released in the early hours of 1 January. Following the standoff, demonstrators regrouped and moved away from the prison under continued police pressure, later continuing through central London and dispersing at Piccadilly Circus. At the centre of the protests is a coordinated hunger strike involving eight remand prisoners held in multiple UK prisons, including Pentonville, Bronzefield, New Hall and Peterborough. All are being held without conviction for alleged offences linked to Palestine Action. Several prisoners are approaching 60 days without food, while two others previously paused their hunger strike following severe health deterioration after more than seven weeks. The hunger strikers’ demands include the closure of Elbit Systems’ UK sites and an end to prolonged pre-trial detention. Doctors, families and supporters have repeatedly warned of escalating health risks, with hospitalisations reported and serious concerns raised about irreversible damage. > Recent demonstrations outside Pentonville have already focused on solidarity > with one of the hunger strikers, Kamran, who is among the Filton 24 arrestees > and has been hospitalised for the fifth time after more than 50 days on hunger > strike. NYE demonstrations were also planned outside prisons in Brixton and > Peterborough this year. Since the proscription of Palestine Action earlier in 2025, the British state has increasingly relied on remand, isolation, and restrictive custodial regimes against those accused of involvement in the group. Supporters describe a pattern including censorship of books and correspondence, denial of prison work, transfers far from family networks, and repeated refusals of bail. > Taken together, activists view the policing of demonstrations and the > treatment of remand prisoners as part of a domestic counter-insurgency > strategy, in which overwhelming police presence, pre-emptive containment and > punitive detention function to send a broader warning to those considering > militant solidarity with Palestine. > In this context, the hunger strike has become a focal point, seen as exposing > how prisons and public order policing are being used to suppress dissent and > discipline political resistance. > > As the new year begins, the prisoners’ fast continues. > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Photos: Blade Runner The post Hundreds at New Year’s Eve London prison protest appeared first on Freedom News.

LABOUR’S WEAPONISATION OF XENOPHOBIC POLITICS NORMALISES CRUELTY AND ENABLES DIVISION OF WORKERS  ~ Simon and Uri talk about the government’s asylum policy abomination, the Pally Action hunger strike, mountains of waste in Oxfordshire, the recent Bristol “Patriots” March, and Maoist violence against Athens anarchists. The post Anarchist News Review: Asylum abomination and Pally hunger strike appeared first on Freedom News.

SOLIDARITY ACTION LINKS SANREMO WITH UK DETAINEES HELD ON REMAND OVER PALESTINE ACTION CASES ~ Blade Runner ~ Italian anarchist prisoner Luca Dolce has joined from his cell in Sanremo the coordinated hunger strike that began in British prisons on 2 November — the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, Britain’s colonial pledge that set the machinery of dispossession and genocide in motion. The British hunger strikers, held on remand for alleged offences linked to Palestine Action and all without conviction, say they will refuse food until Elbit Systems shuts its UK sites. Elbit, long targeted by Palestine Action’s factory occupations, remains Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer. Alongside the strike, the prisoners have launched Prisoners for Palestine, an initiative to collectivise detainees charged over actions in solidarity with Palestinian liberation. At least six prisoners across Bronzefield, New Hall, Pentonville and Peterborough are currently refusing food as part of a rolling action involving dozens who have pledged to join. Since the proscription of Palestine Action earlier this year, the British state has been using remand as a form of domestic counter-insurgency. One of the six strikers spent September on hunger strike after authorities withheld her mail and removed her from her job in the prison library. Today the strikers report censorship of letters, phone calls and books, and say treatment has worsened since the ban — a predictable result when a political movement is reclassified as “terrorism” and handed to the state’s extremism apparatus. From Italy, Luca Dolce made a statement that cuts through the mainstream line that hunger strikes are simply protests about conditions: “The struggle against prison and the military techno-industrial system is essential for a struggle of broader scope, of revolutionary and internationalist resistance. … I stand by their side with serenity and resolve.” Dolce also salutes Palestinian prisoner Anan Yaeesh in Melfi prison in southern Italy, another target of isolation and transfer tactics meant to erase political prisoners. According to Dolce, whether Yaeesh remains on strike is unclear. The British state insists these prisoners are merely defendants awaiting trial. But their captivity functions neatly to suppress a movement that has repeatedly exposed and disrupted the UK’s arms pipeline to Israel. The hunger strike makes visible what the legal process tries to obscure: this is political imprisonment in the service of a war economy. The strikers aren’t appealing for prison reform. They are refusing to cooperate with the machinery designed to put militants out of action. And the fact that prisoners abroad are joining them only underscores the point they are making from their cells: the death machine is international — and so the resistance must be too. The post Italian anarchist joins UK prison hunger strike appeared first on Freedom News.