GB News host Michelle Dewberry has issued a withering putdown of people defending Shamima Begum as she bids to regain her UK citizenship.
It comes after the Court of Appeal heard the decision to deprive Begum of her British citizenship was unlawful.
Begum travelled to Syria in 2015, at the age of 15 - before her British citizenship was revoked on national security grounds shortly after she was found in a Syrian refugee camp in February 2019.
Her lawyers are now bidding to overturn the decision to revoke her citizenship after the 24-year-old earlier this year lost a challenge against the decision at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC).
Michelle Dewberry has hit out at claims Shamima Begum deserves sympathy
GB NEWS / PA
Speaking on GB News, Michelle Dewberry hit out at any suggestion of sympathy for the ISIS bride, saying “it makes me laugh”.
She commented: “Born and bred whatever, yet despite all of that, she still thought it was a good idea to join this terrorist organisation that seeks to destroy this country and our way our living.
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“The fact that she went to school and has all these British mates, I couldn’t care less to be honest.
“It just demonstrates to me that despite all that, she was still anti this country.
“It makes me laugh, well it doesn’t make me laugh because it’s actually sad, these people who say ‘she was only a child, she was innocent and young at 16’.
“In the very next breath they will say, ‘you see that 16-year-old who now identifies as a boy, they’re definitely okay to chop their own breasts off, take hormones and all the rest of it’.”
Undated file photo of Islamic State bride Shamima Begum who said she regrets speaking to the media and wishes she had found a different way to contact her family.gbnewsThree senior judges were told the Home Office failed to consider the legal duties owed to Ms Begum as a potential victim of trafficking or as a result of “state failures” in her case.
Samantha Knights KC said in written submissions: “The appellant’s trafficking was a mandatory, relevant consideration in determining whether it was conducive to the public good and proportionate to deprive her of citizenship, but it was not considered by the Home Office.
“As a consequence, the deprivation decision was unlawful.”
In its ruling earlier this year, SIAC concluded there were “arguable breaches of duty” by state bodies – including the Metropolitan Police, Tower Hamlets council and Begum’s school – in not preventing her from travelling to Syria.
Lawyers for the Home Office, which is set to begin oral arguments on Wednesday, have told the court that SIAC’s conclusion was correct.
Sir James Eadie KC, for the department, said in written submissions: “The fact that someone is radicalised, and may have been manipulated, is not inconsistent with the assessment that they pose a national security risk.
“Ms Begum contends that national security should not be a ‘trump’ card. But the public should not be exposed to risks to national security because events and circumstances have conspired to give rise to that risk.”
The hearing before the Lady Chief Justice Lady Carr, Lord Justice Bean and Lady Justice Whipple is set to conclude on Thursday with a decision expected at a later date.
