Five Palestine Action activists face being sentenced as terrorists for breaking windows and throwing red paint at a branch of Barclays Bank in Lancashire.

Brendon O’Hagan, 28; Amanda Kelly, 31; Hmeera Atiqnisar, 31; Mohammed Malik, 28; and Alma Yaniv, 70, were found guilty of causing £212,000 of damage during a direct action protest in Burnley in August 2024. They targeted the bank because it held shares in the Israeli weapons firm Elbit Systems.

After last month’s verdicts the judge, Philip Parry, told the prosecution and the defence he intended to consider a “terrorist connection” to the offending, despite neither the jury nor the defendants having previously been informed of the possibility.

Four other Palestine Action activists last month became the first defendants convicted of property damage whose offending – during a raid on Elbit’s Filton factory near Bristol - was deemed by Mr Justice Johnson post-conviction to have a “terrorist connection”.