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LONDON — British booksellers are engaged in a battle against terrorism and free speech after Irish novelist Sally Rooney said her books can no longer be sold in the UK because she financially supports the banned Palestine Action group.
The announcement by the British publisher Rooney that he will no longer distribute his books has started a debate about the UK government’s decision last year to ban the direct action campaign group as a terrorist group. The ban makes membership or support of Palestine Action a crime punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
Rooney, 35, is the author of four critically acclaimed novels: “Conversations with Friends,” “Normal People,” “Beautiful World, Where are You” and “Intermezzo.” Her books have sold millions of copies, and both “Conversations with Friends” and “Normal People” have been adapted for television by the BBC.
She supports the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which calls for a boycott of Israeli businesses, universities and cultural institutions over Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. Israel sees the move as an attack on the legitimacy of the Jewish state.
After the UK banned Palestine Action in July 2025, Rooney said she would use money from her books and TV adaptations to support the group. On Wednesday her British publisher, Faber, said that paying her royalties could prevent the terror ban and that they had “decided that we can no longer bring her work to the UK in any form.”
They said the decision was made with Rooney’s approval.
“I have made every effort to be honest with the public about my beliefs and intentions, and I am fully prepared to accept the outcome,” the writer said in a statement.
Faber’s announcement left British bookshops scrambling to find out if they were breaking the law by selling Rooney’s books.
The Booksellers Association later said it had “confirmed with Faber that, although these titles are no longer available for order from UK bookshops, they can continue to sell their existing stock within the UK market.”
Some stores rushed to stock Rooney’s novels, only to find that distributors had already run out.
“We thought we’d get a whole bunch before we were out of stock,” said Lucy Burke, a bookseller at London’s Camden Town Bookshop. “Because the seller is very popular here, and very evergreen. But now it seems that what we have is all we have.”
Burke described the situation as “absolutely ridiculous” and said it was censorship of “one of our most prominent writers”.
Palestine Action, which was founded in 2020, aims to stop the UK’s military aid to Israel, which it says is committing genocide against the Palestinians – a claim that Israel strongly denies.
The group says it aims to stop genocide by disrupting “the physical enablers of Israel’s military-industrial complex.”
In 2024 their activists broke into a factory owned by Israeli arms manufacturer Elbit Systems UK, smashing equipment with sledgehammers and crowbars. The following year, protesters broke into a Royal Air Force base in June 2025, sprayed red paint into the engines of two tanker planes and caused further damage with crowbars.
The group says it does not advocate violence against people, but a police officer suffered a broken spine when she was hit with a hammer during the factory break-in.
The British government says that Palestine Action “has committed acts of terrorism, identified those who participated in them and encouraged the use of violence.”
“The ban on Palestinian Action does not affect legal protest in support of the Palestinian cause, which remains a fundamental democratic right,” the Home Office said in a statement.
Civil liberties groups say the ban unfairly limits the rights to protest and free speech. In response to the government’s decision, thousands of people have demonstrated the law by silently holding signs saying “I support Palestine Action.”
More than 3,000 people have been arrested, and more than 1,200 charged under the Terrorism Act, although no one has yet been convicted.
The scale of the arrests, and the profile of those detained – including pensioners in their 80s and 90s – has put Britain’s Labor Party government under pressure.
The centre-left government has tried to rebuild bridges with Palestinian supporters since Prime Minister Andy Burnham replaced Keir Starmer in July.
Last month the UK formally recognized the state of Palestine and banned goods from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband said his message to people “moved and frustrated by the plight of the Palestinian people” was “We hear you. You were right.”
The government has not lifted the ban on Palestine Action, however, and the group continues to contest its accusation in court.
The High Court ruled in February that classifying Palestine Action as a terrorist organization alongside the likes of al-Qaida and Hamas was unfair and illegal. The Court of Appeal overturned that decision in June, saying the group’s ban was “just and appropriate.”
Next month the group’s lawyers will ask the country’s top court, the UK Supreme Court, to lift the ban.
John Clegg, bookseller at the London Review Bookshop, told The Guardian that Rooney’s stance could help change the law.
“Good on her for standing up, this seems like a stupid law. If this thing convinces the Home Office to move faster to get rid of it, I’m all for it.”
