Event: pro-Palestinian

Five pro-Palestinian activists are due to appear in court over an attack on an Israeli arms company in Germany, in proceedings their families say could become a “show trial”.The Berlin-based activists, who are British, Irish, German and Spanish citizens, have been held in pre-trial detention in separate prisons since 8 September. They are alleged to have broken into Elbit Systems, in the city of Ulm in Baden-Württemberg, in the early hours of 8 September, causing hundreds of thousands of euros of damage before calling the police to arrest them.The Ulm 5 have been charged with trespass, destruction of property and participation in a criminal organisation under section 129 of the German criminal code. The trial is due to start on Monday.The section 129 charge means authorities consider the accused a threat to society, allowing them to deny bail. Families of the defendants say they have been locked up for up to 23 hours a day and had access to visits, books, phone calls and mail restricted. If found guilty, they face up to five years in prison.A protest camp outside the Elbit Systems factory targeted by the five activists in Ulm, Germany. Photograph: Dpa Picture Alliance/AlamySpeaking on behalf of all the defendants, Benjamin Düsberg, a lawyer for Daniel Tatlow-Devally, 32, from Dublin, said he believed the German state was trying to make an example of the five, none of whom has a previous conviction.The attack on the weapons factory was an action in “defence of others” in trying to obstruct the movement of arms to Israel, he said.Düsberg, one of eight defence lawyers, said: “We intend to use the proceedings to essentially turn the tables. We want to show that it’s not our clients who should be on the hook, but rather the Elbit bosses, who continued delivering weapons even…

Ryanair is to shut its Berlin operating base and cut its winter schedule to the German capital in half, blaming soaring aviation taxes in the country.The Irish budget carrier said its relocation of seven aircraft to other centres would reduce its Berlin passenger numbers from 4.5 million to 2.2 million a year, with flights in and out of the city served from October by planes based at other airports.Staff at the facility are being offered transfers to other European bases.Eddie Wilson, the chief executive of the airline’s main operating company, Ryanair DAC, said: “German aviation is broken. The government admits that it is uncompetitive, yet there is no strategy to cut aviation taxes or high airport fees – despite Ryanair warning that Germany would lose traffic, connectivity, jobs and trade.“Since 2019, Ryanair has been forced to close its bases in Frankfurt, Düsseldorf and Stuttgart … in addition to stopping all flights to Dresden, Leipzig and Dortmund.” Ryanair said these closures had led to the loss of 13 aircraft from those bases.The German trade union Verdi criticised Ryanair’s plans as a “purely profit-oriented corporate strategy”. Dennis Dacke, the head of Verdi’s federal aviation division, said the airline’s employees had for too long been treated like “disposable commodities” while the company based its location decisions on short-term profit interests.The announcement of the withdrawal has come at a time when the airline industry is in turmoil as it wrestles with surging costs following the conflict in the Gulf. The price of jet fuel has more than doubled since the conflict began at the end of February.Penalties on airlines that cancel UK flights because of jet fuel shortages have been eased, and Ryanair’s boss, Michael O’Leary, has warned of having to cancel as much as 10% of late summer flights if shipping does not…