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Judges in the High Court have delivered a Valentine's gift to every thug and anti-Semite who cheerleads for Palestine Action.
In a contradictory and deeply concerning ruling, Dame Victoria Sharp, Mr Justice Swift and Mrs Justice Steyn agreed the group had 'organised and undertaken actions amounting to terrorism.'
But the judges concluded the process the Home Office followed to ban the group led to a 'disproportionate' decision.
Perhaps the most ludicrous aspect of their ruling was that Palestine Action has 'not yet' carried out the 'level, scale and persistence' of activities that would allow it to be proscribed.
Only a 'very small number of its actions have amounted to terrorist action,' the judges said. Bafflingly, they would have us believe that Palestine Action has not yet perpetrated enough terrorism to be banned as a terrorist group.
Government sources privately described this aspect of the ruling as 'bonkers' last night, and rightly so.
Most troubling for Sir Keir Starmer is the role the European Convention on Human Rights played in yesterday's decision.
The judges ruled that banning the group was a 'stark' interference with its members' human rights, particularly their right to 'freedom of peaceful assembly and freedom of association.'
Palestine Action won a High Court challenge against the Home Office's decision to categorise it alongside the likes of Islamic State. Pictured is Palestine Action co-founders Richard Barnard (left) and Huda Ammori (right)
Supporters of Palestine Action celebrated the decision outside the High Court in London on Friday
Through his long career at the Bar, and since, the Prime Minister has consistently placed the convention and other international treaties above Britain's national interests. As Palestine Action shelters behind human rights law, he is again hoist with his own petard.
Even though the group remains banned pending further legal action, the Metropolitan Police has said it will pause arrests of anyone expressing support for it. What a shambles.
Shabana Mahmood has rightly said she will appeal against yesterday's ruling.
It is hoped the Home Secretary will win but, after that, a further legal challenge is likely at the Supreme Court – so any chance of clarity is months and months away.
There is, therefore, a solid case for the Government to draw up emergency measures to modify the whole process of banning a terrorist group and eliminate any weaknesses in the legislation that have been exploited by Palestine Action.
This mess must be cleared up, and ministers must pull out all the stops to do so quickly.
The PM's judgment is called even further into question by our new revelations over Peter Mandelson's rapaciousness.
When the disgraced peer was the European Union's newly-appointed trade commissioner in 2004 he enjoyed a series of flights aboard a private jet belonging to Oleg Deripaska, owner of the world's largest aluminium producer.
And, at the time, the EU was right in the middle of discussing cutting tariffs – you guessed it – on aluminium.
It is yet another example of how Mandelson has always prioritised his connections with the rich and powerful, regardless of how it may look to the outside world. And it is also yet another unforgivable flaw in Downing Street's vetting of Mandelson before he was appointed as Britain's ambassador in Washington DC last year.
We still wait to learn who knew what, and when. But if Sir Keir's government does not provide full disclosure of the facts, then it, too, will face being destroyed by Mandelson's grasping legacy.
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