Labour has ruled out stripping a controversial Egyptian dissident of his UK citizenship over tweets in which he called for Jews to be killed, saying they are not serious enough to justify it.
Ministers are facing demands to act against dual national Alaa Abd El-Fattah over online posts which also backed violence against the police and and spoke of his hatred for white people.
But they do not believe that what he said in his messages is bad enough to warrant stripping him of citizenship granted by the Tories in 2021.
A source told the Guardian that the legal bar for taking such a step was deliberately set high and the messages, missed by officials for years, did not meet it.
It came as the husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe became the latest of Abd El-Fattah’s high-profile supporters to attack his tweets as ‘indefensible’.
But Richard Ratcliffe, who spent six years campaigning for his wife’s release from an Iranian prison, said he did not regret backing calls to free him, saying human rights are ‘not like Father Christmas‘s presents’ and ‘you don’t just get them if you are good.’
It comes after it emerged that El-Fattah, who spent much of the past decade in prison in Cairo, could have his Egyptian citizenship removed, making it impossible to deport him from Britain under international law.
Ministers are facing demands to act against dual national Alaa Abd El-Fattah over online posts which also backed violence against the police and and spoke of his hatred for white people.
It is understood Sir Keir Starmer was not aware of Mr Abd El-Fattah’s own ‘extremist’ social media posts when he said he was ‘delighted’ he had returned to the UK
It came as the husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe became the latest of Abd El-Fattah’s high-profile supporters to attack his tweets as ‘indefensible’ – but Richard Ratcliffe said he did not regret backing calls to free him (pictured in 2022)
Abd El-Fattah was arrested in Egypt in 2019 and sentenced to five years in prison from 2021, on charges of spreading false news, the same year he was granted UK citizenship.
A UN working group found his detention was arbitrary, warning that he was deprived of his liberty for exercising his right to freedom of expression, and that his time in prison lacked a legal basis.
The British-Egyptian activist was held until September this year, when he was pardoned by president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.
He was allowed to travel to the UK on Boxing Day. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer was criticised after he welcomed him back.
Abd El-Fattah has since apologised for comments he previously made online as far back in 2010, when he appeared to call for violence against Zionists and the police.
Several senior Conservative and Reform UK MPs, including Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage have since urged the Government to consider stripping Mr Abd El-Fattah of his British citizenship.
Speaking to PA Mr Ratcliffe said he did not regret backing calls to free Mr Abd El-Fattah, despite the activist’s previous posts on social media which have since come to light.
‘I don’t regret campaigning for Alaa, nor does Nazanin, even if we were surprised by what has emerged. We have told his family this. Of course, I was shocked by some of his posts.
‘I had no idea, and I should have known. So that is on me for not checking.
‘Some things I have since seen look like they have been taken out of context, and some things just look horrible and indefensible whatever the context was.
‘Maybe they resonated differently in Cairo a decade ago, but they are indefensible to anyone reading in London now fearing the polarisation of the world.’
Mr Abd El-Fattah has since described his more controversial posts as ‘mostly expressions of a young man’s anger and frustrations in a time of regional crises (the wars on Iraq, on Lebanon and Gaza), and the rise of police brutality against Egyptian youth’.
He said: ‘I particularly regret some that were written as part of online insult battles with the total disregard for how they read to other people. I should have known better.’
Downing Street earlier this week described the apology as ‘fairly fulsome’.
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman told reporters: ‘We welcome the return of a British citizen unfairly detained abroad, as we would in all cases and as we have done in the past.’
