Once jihadi bride Shamima Begum sets foot on British soil again, what do you think the chances are of her ever being deported?
Less than zero.
Even if she fails in her legal bid to have her UK citizenship reinstated, she is certain to be granted ‘exceptional leave’ to remain.
For a start, no country would agree to take her. The Syrians will be glad to see the back of Begum, who has been housed in a refugee camp since the collapse of the Isis caliphate. Bangladesh, her family’s ancestral homeland, don’t want her. Why would they?
Shamima Begum says she joined Izal to marry a jihadi and give birth to the next generation of Islamist terrorists. Apparently, she had three children by her Dutch convert husband, but they all died.
For four years, she was a devoted member of the world’s nastiest terrorist organisation, which raped, murdered, maimed and enslaved tens of thousands of innocent men, women and children.
If Izal hadn’t been defeated militarily, does anyone seriously believe she’d be so desperate to return ‘home’ to London?
After a Times correspondent tracked her down last year, she was unrepentant.
‘When I saw my first severed head in a bin, it didn’t faze me at all. It was from a captured fighter seized on a battlefield, an enemy of Islam.’
The fact that said head may have once belonged to a selfless British aid worker didn’t seem to bother her. As far as she was concerned, it served him right for being a filthy infidel.
We still don’t know precisely what role Begum played. She says she joined Izal to marry a jihadi and give birth to the next generation of Islamist terrorists. Apparently, she had three children by her Dutch convert husband, but they all died.
There are also unconfirmed rumours that she commanded a women’s vigilante brigade, punishing other jihadi brides who strayed from the path of righteousness. We’ll probably never find out the truth.
What we do know is that, along with two schoolfriends, she left her home in Bethnal Green, renounced her British citizenship and enthusiastically signed up for the self-proclaimed Islamic State, which controlled thousands of square miles of Iraq and Syria with ruthless and indiscriminate force.
Shamima Begum pictured with her week old son Jerah (left) in Al Hawl camp. She is seen right in a CCTV video grab from February 17, 2015 passing through security barriers at Gatwick Airport
Begum’s apologists ask us to take into account her tender age. She was an impressionable teenager, they insist, who can’t be held responsible for embracing a romantic notion of Islamist rebellion.
But most girls of 15 rebel by getting a tattoo or dyeing their hair green, not by running off to join a fanatical death cult thousands of miles away.
It’s said she was ‘radicalised’ after watching videos of hostages being beheaded, men in cages being set on fire and children mutilated.
As I wrote at the time, who looks at such depraved, sadistic material and concludes: ‘I wouldn’t mind some of that?’
She may only have been the soppy slip of a girl of her supporters’ imagining, but she wasn’t much older than those children slaughtered savagely at the Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, a terrorist attack for which her comrades claimed responsibility.
Last year, she said: ‘I’m not the silly 15-year-old who ran away.’ That’s what has always worried me. She’s a hardened, grown woman with battlefield experience.
Once she’s back here, we can but hope she will repent and lead a blameless, peaceful life in obscurity.
Judges in thrall to the yuman rites racket usually bend over backwards to put the interests of terror suspects ahead of the safety of the population
But what if she decides to strap on a suicide belt and blow herself up on the Central Line? Would you take the risk?
Still, we should have seen yesterday’s Court of Appeal decision coming.
Judges in thrall to the yuman rites racket usually bend over backwards to put the interests of terror suspects ahead of the safety of the population.
The court ruled that she must be allowed to return to Britain to plead her case. ‘Fairness and justice must . . . outweigh national security concerns.’ Why?
Here’s yet one more example, as if another was needed after the perverse Brexit judgments in the Supreme Court, that the aloof, elitist legal establishment is hopelessly out of touch with the British people’s sense of fair play.
More to the point, why is it necessary to fly Begum home, probably within days? Yes, we’re a civilised country and the rule of law should be sacrosanct.
But during the pandemic, courts have been taking evidence remotely. If Zoom is good enough for the Johnny Depp trial, why isn’t it good enough for Begum?
Who will stand surety for her? Perhaps Labour’s Pixie Balls-Cooper could offer her a bed, given her legendary generosity towards refugees from Syria.
We can only hope Ministers are so angry with the ruling they resist the temptation to charter a private jet at our expense to bring Begum back — which they did previously with British ‘residents’ released from Guantanamo Bay.
She’s probably already pencilled in for the 8.10am interview slot on Radio 4’s Today programme, followed by a sympathetic profile in the Guardian and a song and dance number on Strictly.
And once Begum wins her case — which is almost inevitable — it will open the floodgates for the repatriation of other ‘British’ jihadis and their brides.
Alarmingly, an estimated 450 Izal fighters are already back here. Only 40 of them have ever been charged with terror offences.
Will Begum be arrested by the Funny People immediately she touches down back in Blighty? I wouldn’t hold your breath.
She has engaged the Left-wing law firm Birnberg Peirce, co-founded by Jean Gareth Peirce, who has been the go-to gal for terror suspects since the heyday of the IRA.
No doubt legal aid will be picking up the bill and, when Begum is safely ensconced back in East London, the mug British taxpayer will continue to lavish her with benefits ad infinitum.
The case is scheduled to last well into 2021. Ker-ching!!
And even if, by some unlikely miracle, she loses, the chances of her ever being kicked out are right up there with the long-term prospects of a snowball in Hell.
Makes you proud to be British.
The Government wants e-scooters to have a top speed of 15.5mph, so they have sufficient power to tackle steep hills and carry ‘heavier users’
Plans to get us out of our cars and onto electric scooters have already run into a series of road blocks.
Rachel Maclean, who is described as the ‘Future of Transport’ minister, said the Government didn’t want to rush in something ‘we might regret later’.
Legalised e-scooters could present an attractive alternative for female commuters who don’t want to cycle wearing a dress.
But they’ve hit inevitable opposition from safety campaigners.
The Government wants e-scooters to have a top speed of 15.5mph, so they have sufficient power to tackle steep hills and carry ‘heavier users’.
Presumably, these ‘heavier users’ are all those XXXL punters patriotically packing away double cheeseburgers under Dishi Rishi’s cut-price happy meal deal. The elf’n’safety brigade say 15.5mph is way too fast.
There are also fears that e-scooter jockeys could drive them on pavements. And for some reason, you will only be allowed to hire, not own, one.
Is this to prevent mod revivalists customising them with a dozen chrome mirrors, a 10ft whip aerial and an Esso tiger tail, like Sting in Quadrophenia?
If these scooters ever get the green light, I have visions of convoys heading to Brighton every Bank Holiday, for a punch-up with eco-friendly rockers on electric motorbikes.
There’ll be porky blokes in World Cup Willie parkas stuffing their faces with drive-thru Big Macs, and Leslie Ash hanging off the back in a Ben Sherman shirt, Tonic mini-skirt and a pair of tasselled loafers.
And what are elf’n’safety going to do when Phil Daniels drives his electric scooter off Beachy Head?
Everybody back on the coach!
We can offend you. Fact!
Gervais admits he couldn’t make The Office on the BBC these days under the prevailing censorious orthodoxy, which has destroyed freedom of expression
Ricky Gervais wouldn’t get away with his brilliant new Netflix comedy After Life on conventional TV. Some of the jokes are unprintable in a family newspaper.
They’d give the woke warriors serious conniptions, especially one about making love to a dwarf. (That’s all I’m telling you.)
Gervais admits he couldn’t make The Office on the BBC these days under the prevailing censorious orthodoxy, which has destroyed freedom of expression.
But why should the Twitter mob be allowed to tyrannise the rest of us? As Gervais told the Radio Times: ‘Just because you’re offended, it doesn’t mean you’re right.’
That could have been me speaking. Or as David Brent would say: FACT!