'Ulm Five' face trial for Elbit Systems protest and sabotage

Trial begins for 'Ulm Five' activists who stormed Elbit Systems over Gaza war ties

The Ulm Five: How Activists Stormed an Israeli Arms Factory in Germany

It is 3:30 a.m. on September 8, 2025, when "Crow," "Daniel," "Leandra," "Vi," and "Zo"—the code names given to the activists by their supporters—arrive in Ulm. Their target: the German branch of Elbit Systems, Israel's largest private arms manufacturer, whose weapons have played a central role in the war in Gaza. Their mission is to shut down the facility.

Their operation is carefully coordinated. According to charges filed by the Stuttgart Public Prosecutor's Office, obtained by our website, a group of six masked individuals—still at large—first storms the main entrance. Wielding a sledgehammer, they smash the front door and windows, set off pyrotechnics, and spray paint slogans like Shut Elbit Down and Child Murderers across the façade. Within minutes, they flee the scene.

But the attack is just a diversion. Meanwhile, Daniel T., Walter T., Leandra R., Hannah H., and Vivien K.—the five activists now standing trial, identified here by their legal names—slip unnoticed through a side window into the building. Footage posted online shows them prying open doors with a crowbar, smashing computers and lab equipment, and spray-painting walls with slogans. Finally, they barricade themselves inside a laboratory. They chant in Arabic, "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free," wave a Palestinian flag, and wait for the police.

Another video captures the moment officers arrive: the activists offer no resistance, surrendering with their hands raised. Unmasked, some have wrapped keffiyehs around their heads and pinned white cloth patches to their clothes bearing the words Palestine Action—the name of the protest group that has also broken into arms factories in the UK, sabotaging military equipment. After the group damaged Royal Air Force aircraft, British authorities initially classified it as a terrorist organization, until London's High Court overturned the designation in February 2026, ruling it unlawful and disproportionate.

On Monday, the trial of the "Ulm Five"—as the activists are known in a solidarity campaign by the pro-Palestinian movement—is set to begin in Stuttgart-Stammheim. One defendant is German; the other four hail from different European countries. All five live in Berlin, many within queer circles, and have been held in pretrial detention since the night of the attack—over seven months ago.

Prosecutors allege the group specifically targeted the company's third-floor laboratory, where they allegedly sprayed red paint from a fire extinguisher onto measuring instruments and electrical devices. The damage is estimated at around one million euros. No one was physically harmed.

Elbit Systems Germany, based at a former Telefunken site in Ulm, produces communication systems, targeting technology, combat software, and drone components. While it remains unclear whether weapons made here have been used in Gaza, the company's website boasts of providing "battle-proven system solutions."

Since the outbreak of the Gaza war, Elbit Systems' revenue has surged. According to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the firm's arms sales rose by nearly 14 percent from 2023 to 2024, reaching the equivalent of approximately €5.4 billion. For comparison, Germany's largest defense contractor, Rheinmetall, generated around €7 billion in arms sales over the same period.

All Signs Point to a High-Stakes Trial—Held in the Same Courtroom Where RAF Terrorists Once Stood Judgment

The proceedings are taking place in Stuttgart-Stammheim, the very courthouse where Red Army Faction (RAF) militants Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof were once tried—a location that underscores the gravity the court appears to assign to this case. The indictment includes charges of property damage, trespassing, membership in a criminal organization under Section 129 of the German Criminal Code, and displaying symbols of terrorist groups. According to our website, prosecutors are pushing for multi-year prison sentences—far exceeding the typical penalties for property offenses.

Defense attorneys for the accused had already filed motions in late January to end their clients' pretrial detention. Rosie T., the sister of one defendant, told our website she was "deeply surprised" when the court rejected her family's bail application. The other four defendants had submitted similar requests—all denied. "They didn't wear masks. They didn't hide," Rosie T. said. "They don't strike me as people who would flee before a trial."

Rosie T. lives in London, and her brother, like her, holds British citizenship. She described the family's struggle to maintain contact with 25-year-old Walter T., saying they cannot even speak to him by phone. Any calls, she explained, must take place in the presence of prison staff—and Stammheim Prison, she claims, lacks the personnel to facilitate them. His lawyer confirmed this to our website.

The trial is also set to be dramatic due to the defense's unorthodox strategy. "We intend to turn the tables," Benjamin Düberg, the attorney for Daniel T., told our website. While the defense does not dispute that the five defendants committed the acts in question, they will argue for acquittal. "The real defendants here are not our clients," Düberg asserted, "but the corporate executives of Elbit Systems Germany and the government officials who approved arms exports to Israel."

The defense plans to invoke a legal justification known as "rechtfertigende Nothilfe" (justifying emergency assistance). Düberg argues that destroying lab equipment and office property belonging to a company supplying the Israeli military constitutes a lawful act "because the action was aimed at stopping the genocide in Gaza." To support this claim, the defense will seek to prove in court that, at the time of the incident in September 2025, Gaza was the site of genocide and severe human rights violations—and that Germany, through its arms deliveries to Israel, bears complicity.

The legal team will further contend that the activists had no less drastic alternative. Lawsuits against the arms exports, such as those filed by human rights organizations like the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), had failed, they argue, and mass protests had gone unheeded by the state. "In such a situation, the right to self-help may apply—to dismantle part of the war machine," Düberg said. "What matters most to us is that the court acknowledges this action was undertaken to save lives."