is it really possible to take away UK citizenship for British Jihadists who gone to Syria

[ReallyTired]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29019431

I don't see how its possible to remove British nationality from someone who was born in the UK. It would leave them stateless. The European Human Rights Act makes it impossible to hang someone in the UK for high treason. (As tempting as it might be to hang the person who beheaded that poor journalist in syria.)

Surely the answer is for Jihadists to be tried and punished in the accordance with the laws of the countries that they have have committed attrocities. However to put it politely the burden of proof is not quite so strict as the UK in many Islamic states. We also have laws about sending British citizens to places where they might be on the recieving end of torture or the death penality.

Being ruthless is not sacrificing the premises that someone is innocent until proven guilty. There are certain basic rights that make the UK a decent country.

If we are a civilised country then we need to accept that every human on the planet has human rights. (Even people we don't like!) You can't punish someone on the off chance that they might be a jihadist. In the 1940s it was recongised that it was better for a Nazi to go unpunished than to hang an innocent man.

I feel that boarders of countries that are close to Syria and Iraq need to be better patrolled. Turkey has improved boarder control, but far too late. Sadly closing the boarders is about preventing refugees leaving ISIS territory rather than preventing new Jihadists joining ISIS.

Clearly there would have to be solid evidential grounds to suspect a person had gone to fight in an Islamic Jihadist war, but expecting countries often only populated in major towns with large porous mountainous or desert areas – border controls in war torn countries cannot be relied on to stop the organised movement of those wishing to cross borders undetected.

As mentioned elsewhere on other threads, the problem with those radicalise Islamists is that their cause is ‘stateless’, not just within the main branches of Islam causing countries/citizens within the region to side with another and fuel civil wars, Shia and Sunni, but Islam as a whole.

My point being, in allowing radical Islamist with terrorist skills to return and settle back into society, no one can know what UK domestic or international ‘event’ could TRIGGER a return to active radicalism as it is mainly ‘personal’.

If we legally cannot exclude British born, single passport holders, from returning to our shores a point re internment, a potential solution mentioned earlier, was that that in Ireland it did not help. Now we could argue all day is it better or not to lock up those radicalized to such an extent they no longer follow the rule of law and will go underground to plot/kill - but the Irish problems were different, as the Catholic IRA had a known ongoing objective that was negotiably resolvable, it was an Irish and not a European Catholic ‘war’, they did not pose an un-defendable suicide vest threat ,and THEY were fighting for THEIR homeland.

As islamist causes are ‘stateless’ and attacks upon their homeland commonplace, the UK government needs to protect it’s citizens more than such people’s Human Rights. IMO.

Is it me - I think you are underplaying how bad the situation in Northern Ireland was. There also seems to be this idea that suicide bombing is so much more terrible then any other type of terrorist bombing. Feel free to look up "Bloody Friday" and "Patsy Gillespie" and see if that opinion holds.

State overreaction tends to increase anti-state reaction, not decrease it. There are ways of deradicalising people without rolling back the rule of law.

Finally, Guantanamo Bay has failed. No one is any safer for it existing, quite the opposite as it exists as a living monument to State brutality and injustice.

I think it is perfectly reasonable whether or not they have the guts to do it or not we will see. What baffles me is the ones going off to "fight" for Britain that are british citizens i was like at this i mean isnt that what the BA are for ? dont think they should be allowed back in either just adding fuel to the fire and jumping on a bandwagon think they'll come back hero's again . The truth of the matter is blatantly clear that these people are dangerous loons we cannot change them we cannot help them they want to hurt us and our children and families for no reason other than the fact they are pure evil and twisted beyond all hope i know several muslims that have denounced these animals because they have twisted the words of the koran beyond all recognition to disguise their motives and their human rights allow them to hide behind their religion upon return to the UK where they will blow up a tube/bus/building because they simpily do not care if they destory a family or rip apart a community it is all one sick twisted game to them. IMHO yes ban the lot of them. its madness letting people who hate this country and openly denounce it and its people to be allowed to stay. no other country would allow this to happen.

Isitme - I think a useful template for dismantling any such group in the UK, is what was used to dismantle various Red Brigades in Europe in the '70's/80's, because just like those groups IS people in the UK don't have wider public support.

In Germany, they arrested as many of the underlings as possible and offered them reduced sentences if they would testify against senior members of the organisation, which proved very effective.

IPityThePontipines …. First of all, I do not under estimate the previous situation in Northern Ireland, I lived through it, including working/travelling through the City in London when the IRA bombs could and did goi off, with the one next to the Old Bailly/Holborn Viaduct Station, way too close for comfort.

Back then and similar terrorist attacks, bombers targets were more predicable and had a good chance of being thwarted by AN IRA WARNING, security checks looking for bombs in vehicles left unattended near potential targets, citizens reporting suspicious objects on trains etc - and the bombers priorities had their own survival to see their family again and/or fight another day, high on their personal priority list.

Suicide bombers just appear, there is little defence to a bomb detonated by an Islamist it is strapped to, whether citizens of their own country walking into a public place/train as per our 7/7, or foreign Islamists flying into the Twin Towers on 9/11. Why can’t you see that?

Your point on western terror groups don’t have “wider support” may have been true about the Red Brigade, but certainly not re the IRA in Catholic areas of Northern Ireland back in the day, or the Muslim’s I call “stateless” because of their willingness to fight in far flung places DUE to their religion. Taking Sunni ISIS as an example, how many left Syria and entered Iraq in Sunni areas and what is there numbers now from local recruits (6,000 last month?) and how could this happen without local Sunni support?

Clearly many British Muslims are being radicalized under their family’s, or apparently local mosques noses, so who can cite ‘no public support’ as a defence, when there are many thousands preaching hate over the internet from god knows what shit hole in the world?

So what is societies defence against Muslims (or anyone else) who can be sitting eating with their loving families one day, and then killing other people/families a week later ?

So if intelligence services cannot protect us when an individual can decide he or she needs to go to kill in a place they have never even visited – they can certainly protect us when a UK citizen in then KNOWN to have fought with Islamic Jihadists - so adds terrorist experience to a now hair trigger threat of a terrorist action.

Re “state overreaction”, I’d suggest the problem is that we have not reacted soon enough, as how come the U.S. with a sizable Muslim population themselves, not have the radicalized stateless religious problem that WE have, if not for being a state aware of the problems and a well funded security service staying on top of it.

So if as it appears the UK/security services has already left it too late, if Muslims themselves don’t CURRENTLY see the radicalization emerging in their loved ones, maybe the prospect of knowing the potential losses of their family members, killed in war, exiled, or locked up, will increase INTERNAL vigilance amongst the communities.

I will not go into your argument along the lines that if we have 100 murderers, or 100 proven terrorists (as what may be a ‘freedom fighter’ here, is a terrorist to those being killed) and by locking up 50 we are no safer, so why not let the 100 be free to potentially do their ‘stuff’ – as it is flawed on so many levels, regarding those NEEDING protection starting with the odds against a bomb being made.

Regarding the use of internment should we not be able to exile sole British Passport holders, I will concede that a Guantanomo Bay solution might be too extreme, as unlike the non Americans held by the U.S. at the Bay, those held WOULD BE our citizens and arguably ‘deserve’ a chance at de-radicalization – but within a State unable to understand the trigger, their lives on release SHOULD be so monitored, they hopefully would decide on release it better to return to an Islamic country to live.

In Conclusion; starting with a default position prioritizing those who’d do us harms ‘Human Rights’, and plucking very different European examples as a reason to do nothing, defies all basic homeland security logic – especially if the Islamists CAUSE is not originally anti domestic and POTENTIALLY festering within any Muslim family.

Those who have gone overseas to fight others wars on an inter Muslim crusade, and whose new ‘work experience’ will be a threat to the UK, possibly triggered via our own states foreign policy to the Middle East, is literally a ticking time bomb the rest of us HAVE to be protected from.

Is it me - plenty of bombs didn't get thwarted. Mass shootings didn't either.

You have grossly simplified my argument about the interplay between state and anti-state bodies.

My point about no widespread support is there will only ever be small numbers of people involved, which makes it easier to track down and isolate those involved.

I never said we should do nothing. I gave clear examples of what could be done. Your insistence that it wouldn't work seem to stem from a desire to view brown terrorists as more dangerous then white ones.

IpityThePontipines ..... are you talking about the Irish threat to the Irish, or Irish threat to the British mainland, as the bombs going off were far more over there and the Protestants SHOT/BOMBED BACK; in the mainland here, we 'the people' did not have the option to arm ourselves and fight back, so we relied on the government.

On "the numbers involved", how do WE know the extent of the problem now, and those of the future, in what could be decades ahead of inter Muslim conflict - never mind Muslim vs western conflicts that WILL result from the west trying to 'help' in stopping the Muslim vs Muslim deaths, in killing Muslims themselves - and raising anti west nationalist/religious tensions in a downward conflict spiral RAISING the UK domestic threat?

As for examples of what could be done, do you disagree with me that WE DON'T FULLY UNDERSTAND WHAT TRIGGERS those British born Muslims out of millions to join ISIS?

As if (and I believe them) their parents don't understand it and failed to recognize it, how can we come up with solutions like an Irish Republic, or get Red Brigade members to grass when it was nothing like the size of this problem and not caused by inter sect religion over several countries, when the radicalization source hundreds of years old, is thousands of miles away and those conflicts/words over the internet, all happen in the name of religion.

You give me a firm solution, if say 500 only have gone to fight to date, say 250 survive/return to the UK, what do you want done with battle hardened terrorists? Confine them to their bedroom on the naughty chair, and hope they don't get away from a supervision order and go underground for days or weeks, before carrying a 'western aggression' in the Middle East caused bomb somewhere?

they hopefully would decide on release it better to return to an Islamic country to live.

The problem is, many people of the new state they are creating don't want this medieval blood shed either and the poor women! Suddenly finding themselves shackled under this Sharia Law.

All the men and the women who choose it should find a little corner of the world in which to practise their extreme relgion and leave everyone else alone.

Home land security IS the main priority here and your right ISITME, we have acted FAR FAR FAR TOO late on all this.

The horses have bolted, thousands of them and hundreds of bored and dissatisfied young men are sitting round wondering whether to make a bomb and make something of their lives and we can do nothing about it.

As if (and I believe them) their parents don't understand it and failed to recognize it, how can we come up with solutions

Their parents would struggle to talk sense to them because its very tricky to critise the Koran, and it can be interpreted in many ways. Its very convoluted and not open.

This is why we need urgent respected world leaders from the Muslim World to condemn Isis

BornFreeButinChains …. Re a couple of your points.

Firstly the ‘draw’ of ISIS and their proposed new Islamist Caliphate is not just affecting the countries in the west, as young fighters are joining them in the Middle East from Muslim communities within the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and probably Pakistan where ISIS leaflets have been found.

Listening to a few of Cameron’s comments over the last few days, a major concern to everyone is that the unchecked successes of ISIS, militarily gaining a huge amount of land within Syria and Iraq with a small army and relatively few casualties, adds to the appeal as the Caliphate seems to be within ISIS’s grasp due to the distracting internal politics/civil wars within Iraq and Syria.

Hence it is in everyones interest, east, west, and certainly within the Middle East, to confront the growth and activities of ISIS as they did Al-Qaeda, and then wait for whatever comes after.

Re ‘a little corner to practice their extreme religion’, the problem is arguably Sunnis that make up between 85-90% of Muslims is the stricter of the two, and I guess it is no coincidence that Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and even Hamas has that branch in common with ISIS – the problem is there is rarely a country that has just Sunnis within. Even strict Saudi Arabia that has around 87% Sunnis and their Religious Police, has this religious contrast, where thousands of Saudi Princes and others get their ‘jollies’ by travelling over the Causeway to Bahrain, or leave on long holidays to……anywhere else east or west really.

Re your comment re parent and children talking for fear of criticising the Koran, now I am no authority at all on the Koran (or bible for that matter), but I’d suggest that there is no more ‘smiting’ anyone in the Koran than within parts of the bible. I doubt if anywhere within the killing of innocents is actively encouraged, especially fellow Muslims.

but I’d suggest that there is no more ‘smiting’ anyone in the Koran than within parts of the bible

Its different, the bible is openly criticized, we are free to pick and choose religions poke fun at the Pope and nothing will happen.

In Islam its very different, offense is taken very quickly and easily, communities from upon all sorts of things, traditions seem stronger, ties seem stronger.

It would be far better for everyone if the countries you mentioned acted against ISIS, sent troops in, bombed ISIS, why are they not doing so?

www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/syria-crisis-british-jihadists-becoming-disillusioned-at-fighting-rival-rebels-and-not-assad-regime-9713279.html

surprise surprise.

I guess how we deal with these men wanting to return will let the ones still wanting to go out, see what their options are.

I'd automatically renounce my (US) citizenship if I joined the military of any foreign state hostile or not, so it seems legit that I could renounce my UK citizenship similarly by fighting on behalf of any enemy?

You can't renounce a citizenship if you don't have another one though. Neither states, nor individuals can voluntarily make others, or themselves stateless.