Henry Zeffman,Chief Political Correspondentand
Nick Eardley,Political Correspondent
BBC
The Conservatives have called for a British-Egyptian activist to be deported and his UK citizenship to be revoked after social media messages emerged of him calling for Zionists to be killed.
Sir Keir Starmer has been criticised for saying he was “delighted” by Alaa Abdel Fattah’s arrival in the UK after being freed from prison in Egypt, but it is understood he was unaware of the messages before this week.
Shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick said Abd El Fattah should “be made to live in Egypt or frankly anywhere else in the world”.
He told the BBC it was wrong for Abd El Fattah to have been granted citizenship in the first place – something that took place in 2021 when the Conservatives were in power.
The Foreign Office said it had been “a long-standing priority under successive governments” to work for Abd El Fattah’s release and see him reunited with his family in the UK, but condemned his “abhorrent” posts.
Abd El Fattah arrived in the UK this week after being convicted in 2021 of “spreading fake news” in Egypt for sharing a Facebook post about torture in the country. His family has been approached for comment.
He was granted citizenship in December 2021 through his London-born mother.
Jenrick said he did not consider it “defensible” that Abd El Fattah received citizenship when his social media showed that he had “extremist views that are completely incompatible with British values”.
Jenrick said: “Successive governments and civil servants at the Foreign Office and the Home Office have advised ministers that this is a consular case to be supported, when in fact a cursory examination of… so
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