In a historic legal move, the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has formally petitioned the British government to remove it from the UK’s list of proscribed terrorist organisations.
The application, submitted on April 9, 2025, by London-based firm Riverway Law on behalf of senior Hamas official Dr. Mousa Abu Marzouk, calls the proscription politically motivated, legally flawed, and complicit in Britain’s historic role in Palestinian dispossession.
Framing the UK’s 2021 full ban on Hamas as an extension of its colonial entanglements in the Middle East, the 106-page legal submission asserts that Hamas is a legitimate political and resistance movement engaged in the struggle for Palestinian liberation — not a terrorist entity, and certainly not a threat to British national security.
Hamas and Hezbollah: Elected but Banned
Both Hamas and Hezbollah, often described in the West through the lens of militancy, are in fact political movements with democratic mandates. Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian legislative elections in a contest widely acknowledged as fair and transparent. Hezbollah similarly holds substantial electoral power in Lebanon’s parliament and government, with deep support among Lebanon’s Shia population.
Despite their legitimacy at the ballot box, both movements were fully banned by the UK under the Terrorism Act 2000 — Hamas in 2021 and Hezbollah in 2019 — after years of pressure by pro-Israel lobby groups in Westminster.
The Lobby That Shaped British Policy
The case of Hezbollah’s proscription illustrates how British policy has, at times, been shaped more by lobbying than security assessments. Before 2019, the UK only banned Hezbollah’s military wing. But under then-Home Secretary Sajid Javid, a known ally of Conservative Friends of Israel (CFI), the UK moved to ban the group in its entirety.
Insiders have confirmed that the move was driven not by intelligence, but by external pressure. Former Foreign Minister Sir Alan Duncan, in his diaries, accused Javid of “sucking up to the CFI,” while lamenting that Parliament was “scripted in Israel’s cause.”
The ban was celebrated across party lines by figures associated with Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) as well, despite earlier resistance from Theresa May’s Cabinet, which had warned of the complex political role Hezbollah plays in Lebanon.
This same model of political pressure appears to have been replicated in the case of Hamas — with similar consequences. Rather than serving peace, critics say the bans have removed legitimate political actors from the negotiating table and narrowed the space for diplomacy.
Resistance, Not Terrorism
Riverway Law’s legal challenge seeks to correct what it calls a dangerous distortion: that Israel is defending itself, while Palestinians — including Hamas — are cast as aggressors. According to the legal argument, this reverses the reality of the conflict. Hamas, the filing argues, is defending the Palestinian people against decades of occupation, siege, and military aggression by Israeli terrorism.
Under international law, a state engaged in occupying another people’s territory has no legal right to use “self-defense” to justify violence against the population it occupies. Occupation itself is a form of aggression, and resistance to that occupation — including armed resistance — is a recognized right under international resolutions.
In this light, the UK’s ban on Hamas not only endorses Israel’s military campaigns in Gaza, but also erases the structural violence of colonisation — settlements, expulsions, blockades, and apartheid laws — that define Palestinian reality. To criminalize Hamas while affirming Israel’s right to bomb Gaza is to invert international law, and to grant legal immunity to an occupying power that has been accused of thousands of war crimes, and whose leaders are wanted by the International Criminal Court.
“When occupiers invoke the right of self-defense against those they occupy,” the legal submission argues, “international law is not being upheld — it is being weaponized to suppress resistance.”
Free Speech, Criminalised
Beyond foreign policy, the application also highlights the domestic implications of Hamas’s proscription. Under current UK law, expressing support for Hamas — even in political or academic contexts — can be grounds for arrest. Riverway Law argues this violates freedom of speech and association, protected under the European Convention on Human Rights.
Barrister Daniel Grütters, who supports the legal challenge, stated:
“Regardless of your opinion on Hamas, a policy which has the effect of stifling discussion is unhelpful and acts as a substantial hurdle to reaching a long-term political settlement.”
A Moment to Change Course
Fahad Ansari, director of Riverway Law, framed the case as a moral and historical reckoning:
“This is an opportunity for Britain to change course from its longstanding complicity in settler colonialism and apartheid — dating back to the Balfour Declaration and continuing through the current genocide in Gaza.”
The firm has drawn support from international human rights advocates, including South Africa’s Media Review Network, which likened the demonisation of Hamas to the global campaign once waged against the African National Congress (ANC). “Liberation movements are always vilified before they are legitimised,” the MRN said in a statement backing the application.
The Stakes: Diplomacy or Dead Ends
The legal challenge comes amid Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza. After the October 7, 2023, attacks in which Hamas fighters took 250 hostages, Israel launched a bombing campaign that has since killed over 50,000 Palestinians and flattened much of the enclave. The devastation has solidified the region’s descent into despair.
The application argues that peace is not possible without political inclusion. “History tells us that it will be necessary for the British and other governments to speak to people and organisations who win elections, even and especially if one disagrees with some of their values and actions.”
Awaiting the Verdict
The UK Home Secretary now has 90 days to respond. If the application is rejected, it may be appealed to the Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission, which has the power to reverse proscription orders.
More than a legal dispute, the case raises urgent questions about Britain’s relationship with international law, colonial history, and its role in the search for justice in Palestine. It will test whether the UK is prepared to face those questions honestly — or remain bound by the political pressures that shaped its past.
