'How can I move on?': Palestine Action's Fatema Rajwani on life after prison

Fatema Rajwani turned 20 the day before she broke into an Israeli-owned arms factory on 6 August 2024.

Then a film student at Goldsmiths University in London, she was living at home with her family, not spending more than a couple of months away from them at a time.

Growing up, Rajwani said she had not been particularly politically active, save for a few demonstrations she attended with her mother.

“Palestine was always in the background of my life, but it was never something I was particularly passionate about,” she told Middle East Eye.

But that changed with the launch of Israel’s genocide in Gaza in October 2023. Rajwani found herself scrolling through horrifying images on her phone, unable to do anything about it.

She tried everything she could think of: protests, boycotts. But nothing seemed to have any effect. 

For Rajwani, there was no specific moment she could pinpoint that motivated her decision to take action. It was a growing awareness of the role that the Israeli arms firm Elbit Systems played in the genocide that brought her to the company’s factory floor on the night of 6 August.

"It’s bizarre, horrific, that their business is inventing new ways of killing people. That is the business of Elbit Systems, and that is the business that the Filton site in Bristol researches and develops," Rajwani said.

“I couldn't sit there and do nothing. I couldn't look at myself in the mirror sometimes. Watching people die and not being able to do a single thing about it.”

Rajwani is the youngest of six defendants who were recently acquitted by jurors at Woolwich Crown Court in London following a months-long trial on charges of aggravated burglary.

'I couldn't sit there and do nothing. I couldn't look at myself in the mirror sometimes. Watching people die and not being able to do a single thing about it'

The case surrounded a Palestine Action raid at the UK Elbit Systems plant near Bristol. Rajwani, along with two of her co-defendants, was also acquitted of charges of violent disorder.

The six now face a retrial planned for 16 February 2027 on charges that had not ended in verdicts, including criminal damage and violent disorder.

Following their acquital, the defendants were granted bail, as were another 18 defendants connected with the case after the prosecution dropped the same aggravated burglary charge against them.

Only one defendant, Samuel Corner, who faces charges of causing grievious bodily harm with intent for striking a police officer with a sledgehammer, remains in custody.

From the moment of her arrest in August 2024, Rajwani said she had to “grow up very quickly”. 

"I had to become my own person and learn how to deal with court systems, solicitors, the aggravated burglary charge, prisons, prison guards," Rajwani said.

"All of those things are so much to comprehend, especially when you're that young. It was just insane."

‘Completely out of their depth’

Rajwani described the incident at the Elbit plant as “one of the most horrifying experiences” of her life.

During the trial, the court heard that the activists were met with excessive force by the security guards, who were subcontracted to Minerva Elite, a "risk-management and resilience consultancy".

Bodycam footage presented to the jury appeared to show security guard Angelo Volante allegedly striking defendant Jordan Devlin in the neck with a sledgehammer, knocking him to the ground.

A series of images and a body map detailing Devlin’s wounds, including a black eye, were presented to the jury.

In another clip, Volante is seen brandishing a whip and running towards Jordan Devlin, who was unarmed. He then picked up a sledgehammer and swung it at Devlin and co-defendant Rogers.

When giving evidence, Volante said the activists were "armed" and "resorted to using physical violence". 

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Real Media and Declassified reported that police and security guard witnesses changed their initial statements under cross-examination. For example, PC Aaron Buxton initially said in his witness statement that he had seen Devlin holding a sledgehammer, but when shown footage, he admitted the defendant had been unarmed and Volante had wielded the sledgehammer.

According Minerva Elite's website, its staff are "drawn from service with United Kingdom Special Forces, UK military intelligence organisations and specialist Police units".

Footage also appeared to show defendant Samuel Corner striking a police officer with a sledgehammer. The court heard that Corner was sprayed with incapacitant spray - which causes temporary vision loss and disorientation - moments before the alleged attack.

Jurors also heard that footage was missing from several CCTV cameras covering areas of the factory floor where contested interactions between security guards and the defendants took place.

PC Sarah Grant, a CCTV recovery officer tasked with retrieving the security footage from Elbit Systems, told the court she did not download footage from two cameras because they showed no movement, due to a low frame rate.

The prosecution argued in court that the action was “meticulously planned”, and that the defendants “knew well” the scale of what they were agreeing to do.

But the defence disputed this, saying the action did not go “remotely to plan” and that the defendants were “completely out of their depth”.

When Rajwani gave evidence, she told the court “the whole reason I was doing it was because I hated violence. The last thing I wanted was to cause people injury.”

MEE approached Elbit Systems and Minerva Elite for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication.

‘Are you mad at me?’

Rajwani told MEE she felt “numb” when she learnt that she was being remanded to prison.

“It came in bits and pieces. When my first bail application was rejected and then my second, it was crushing. I felt like I was never going to leave.”

After repeated bail refusals, she wound up spending 18 months behind bars - outstripping the standard UK pre-trial custodial time limit.

Rajwani said this experience will mark her forever.

“It felt like I was existing in a vacuum. It felt like there wasn't going to be an end to this. It's like the government and the state had total control over who I was as a person and over my entire life,” she told MEE.

When she was first remanded into custody at HMP Bronzefield, Rajwani was not able to speak to her mother for two weeks. 

When she was finally able to call her, the first words that came out of Rajwani’s mouth were: “Are you mad at me? Are you upset with me?”

But with their conversation closley monitored, Rajwani’s mother felt unable to express her true feelings and offer the comfort her daughter sought.

“It was very strange, speaking to her in a place that is constantly monitored, constantly surveilled,” she told MEE. “And also being away from her for so long. That stretch of time away and having complete, utter silence was just a very strange experience.”

'It felt like there wasn't going to be an end to this. It's like the government and the state had total control over who I was as a person and over my entire life'

Rajwani said that, in the aftermath of the government's proscription of Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation, she and her co-defendants were treated like “terrorists”. MEE previously reported that a number of Palestine Action-linked prisoners experienced tightening restrictions in the wake of the ban.

She recalled that officers would frequently enter her cell without warning when she was half-dressed and not wearing her hijab. They would perform book checks to ensure she was not reading any radical material and withhold her personal mail. 

She said one of her co-defendants, Qesser Zuhrah, who was also held at HMP Bronzefield, had her hijab torn from her head when prison officers were confiscating keffiyehs from the defendants.

MEE previously reported that Palestine Action-linked prisoners who were refusing food received sporadic medical care and were, in some instances, denied ambulances when they reported severe chest pains.

Prison authorities, while unable to comment on individual cases, deny the allegations that inmates were mistreated.

An HMP Bronzefield spokesperson told MEE that all prisoners held there are "managed in accordance with the policies and procedures governing the wider prison estate, including specialist multi-agency processes led by the government to assess individual risks and security status".

They added that prisoners are encouraged to raise complaints directly with the prison, and that "there are numerous channels available for addressing such concerns".

Through it all, Rajwani and her co-defendants tried to support each other, delivering notes via other inmates when they were subject to a non-association order which barred them from interacting directly.

“It’s the idea that none of us are going through this alone, if you spend 10 years in prison, I'm going to be right there with you,” she told MEE.

‘I can't believe I just get to be in the world’

Rajwani is still struggling to comprehend that she is no longer behind bars.

"I thought I was going to spend 10 years in prison. That was what I was prepared for," she said.

"And now I can't really comprehend how to live my life. I'm still trying to work out how to move on with my life or where to go with it.

"I still can't believe I just get to be in the world. Just walking down the road, going on a train, eating home-cooked food, all of those things are so surreal."

It’s hard for Rajwani not to look at a police officer or hear a siren and not feel terror. “I’m not the same person I was a year and a half ago,” she told MEE.

But she added: “I will never regret trying to do the right thing.”

“I will never say that I regret trying to make the world a better place.”