ELSC Newsletter: July 2025
ELSC Newsletter: July 2025
Dear Friend,
Over the past month, we’ve fought some crucial battles and secured a number of legal victories, which we bring to you in this month’s newsletter, along with some useful resources to continue mobilising for Palestine.
SAVE THE DATE
Appeal Hearing on Dutch State’s Role in Facilitating Israel’s Genocide and Illegal Occupation
The Court of Appeal in The Hague has set the date for the appeal hearing in the landmark case brought by a coalition of ten Palestinian and Dutch civil society organisations against the Dutch State. The hearing will take place on Wednesday, 3 September 2025, at 10:00 CEST at the Court of Appeal, at Prins Clauslaan 60, 2595 AJ The Hague.
This case demands a clear break: an end to the Dutch government’s role in enabling Israel’s crimes, and accountability for the structures that make them possible. If you want to help hold the Dutch state accountable, contribute to our legal crowdfunding campaign.
Save the date: Appeal Hearing on Dutch State’s Role in Facilitating Israel’s Genocide and Illegal Occupation
Case Updates
ELSC files criminal complaint against police officer BE-24111 who beat up protestors at Nakba Day demo in Berlin
The European Legal Support Center (ELSC) has filed a criminal complaint to the public prosecutor, for assault in office, dangerous physical assault, false accusation and all other applicable offences against a police officer who has been filmed repeatedly punching protesters in the head at Berlin’s Nakba Day demonstration on 15th May 2025.
With our criminal complaint we aim to pursue accountability and pressure the public prosecutor to launch a thorough investigation against the police officer and eventually to put him on trial. We have provided extensive evidence but are prepared to appeal if the public prosecutor decides to drop the case.
Fired for saying “Free Palestine”: Alla Scala Theatre in Milan dismisses Jasmine, a Student Worker, for “two words”
As we have shown in recent years through the cases we’ve followed, the people we’ve defended, and our ongoing monitoring work, there are countless instances where employers restrict their workers’ right to freedom of expression — especially when it concerns Palestine solidarity and opposing Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza.
But Jasmine is fighting back and we at ELSC are supporting her. Together with the grassroots union CUB (Confederazione Unitaria di Base), she has decided to take legal action against Teatro alla Scala. The first hearing is scheduled for September 2025.
Political ban on Dr. Ghassan Abu-Sittah: Germany’s misuse of migration law for authoritarian purposes must stop
Following legal action taken by the European Legal Support Center (ELSC) with support from the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP), the Administrative Court in Berlin has now deemed the ban on Dr. Ghassan Abu-Sittah’s political activities and public speaking in Germany – imposed in April 2024 by Berlin’s Migration office – unlawful.
ELSC & ICJP have previously succeeded in overturning the ban on Dr. Ghassan Abu-Sittah’s entry to the Schengen-area which has prevented him from entering Germany, France and the Netherlands. Following ELSC’s urgent appeal, the Administrative Court Potsdam ruled- in May 2024- that the Schengen ban has no legal basis and had to be revoked immediately. This effectively ended the Schengen-area travel ban imposed on Abu-Sittah by the German authorities.
ELSC takes the Vienna municipality’s SLAPP case against BDS Austria to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR)
After the Austrian Supreme Court dismissed the appeal of a Higher Regional Court decision against a BDS-activist, the European Legal Support Center (ELSC) will now take the case to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), to defend the right of the Palestine solidarity movement to freedom of expression.
ELSC lawyer Kiran comments: “It should alarm all of us that the highest Austrian court simply dismisses a case that provoked the intervention of four UN Special rapporteurs. We will not accept such blatant attempts to intimidate and punish Palestine solidarity activists with overwhelming financial costs and will defend their right to freedom of expression at the European Court for Human Rights.”
KEEP US IN THE FIGHT
Since October 2023, we’ve received 936 legal support requests and are currently working on 323 active cases across six countries. From students and trade unionists to teachers, journalists, and artists, we are defending the people targeted for refusing to stay silent.
ELSC EVENTS
Our Monitor Project Manager Layla and ELSC Lawyer Alexander joined our comrades in Berlin for the launch of a new report exposing how Germany targets solidarity through bans, surveillance and criminalisation, sharing insights from our legal work and our Index of Repression.
As the movement for Palestinian liberation continues to grow in strength and numbers globally, Zionism as an ideology is at its weakest. Consequently, criminalisation of Palestine solidarity has escalated to more and more extreme levels. ELSC Lawyer Alexander joined a panel on ‘Our Right to Reject Zionism: Combatting Zionism in and beyond the courtroom’ in Berlin, discussing offensive legal strategies and tactics for organising for the dismantlement of Zionism and fighting state violence and repression, from the courts to the streets.
ELSC IN THE MEDIA
Our Senior Communications Officer Abir spoke to Al Mashhad about the systemic repression of the Palestine solidarity movement across Europe and in Germany specifically, shedding light on the ELSC’s case challenging a ruling by the Higher Administrative Court Berlin-Brandenburg before the Federal Constitutional Court after German authorities forced a Palestinian-Jordanian mother to separate from her one-year-old son for months, who was initially deemed as a “security threat” in a letter from the German Embassy in Amman. Read more about the case here and watch the full interview below.
TG Drutti from the Berlin Left spoke to our Monitor Project Manager Layla and our Monitor Officer in Germany Sophia about the ELSC’s monitor database, racialised violence, the abuse of legal ambiguity, fear, criminalisation, and threats to deportation to stifle and isolate the movement in solidarity with Palestine. Layla and Sophia shared situated analysis and reflections on how to mobilise this knowledge to fight repression.
RESOURCES OF SUPPORT
Toolkit: Disrupting energy corporations for the liberation of Palestine
Fossil fuel supply chains fuel and fund settler colonialism and the ongoing genocide in Palestine. Military violence has intensified during the ongoing genocide, but these supply chains have been powering slow violence and ethnic cleansing in Palestine for decades.
This new toolkit offers a deep dive into two companies – Eni and Dana Petroleum – exposing their colonial roots, environmental destruction, and ongoing struggles against their operations in countries across the world. With this data and tactical inspiration, grassroots divestment campaigners, student groups, union organisers and climate campaigners can help block the flow of money and power to Israel.
We are proud to be in community with you. As you continue to organise and take action, make sure to visit our Know Your Rights resources and continue to report any form of repression.
In solidarity,
The ELSC
