Author Archives: Ruvi Ziegler

The August 2024 riots: an opportunity to turn a page in Britain’s flawed immigration debate

The beginning of August was a heated period in the UK (on this occasion not attributable to climate change). A weekend-long spree of violence across several towns and cities, mainly in the North of England, saw rioters attempt to set fire to hotels housing asylum-seekers and to a mosque, attack police with bricks, set up ‘checkpoints’ where non-white drivers were stopped, and abuse Muslim women by stripping off their hijabs. The pretext for these riots was misinformation about the identity of the perpetrator of a horrendous knife attack in the city of Southport which killed three young girls. As it happens, the recently-turned-18 year old man was born in Wales to Rwandan Christian parents.

On Monday morning, a message identifying offices of refugee and migrant support groups and law firms as potential targets for a concerted attack was circulated, prompting communities throughout the UK to congregate in large numbers to fend off potential attacks. Many of those prosecuted so far have been charged with violent disorder, which carries a maximum sentence of five years. The clampdown on rioters prompted a claim that it supposedly reflects ‘two tier policing’: lenient on some, harsh on other. Yet, just a week before the August riots, several ‘Just Stop Oil’ activists were sentenced to 5 years’ imprisonment for holding a zoom planning meeting for blocking the M25. Indeed the last time the UK experienced mass riots, in the summer of 2011, a certain Keir Starmer, now Prime Minister, was Director of Public Prosecutions. Those riots were prompted by the killing of a black man, Mark Duggan, by the police; on that occasion, most of those arrested, convicted, and sentenced to lengthy prison sentences were black and minority ethnic (BAME).

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The ICJ Advisory Opinion on the illegality of Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territories

On 30 December 2022, the UN General Assembly passed resolution A/RES/77/247 in which it asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to opine on two questions:

First, what are the legal consequences arising from the violation of the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination by Israel’s prolonged occupation, settlement and annexation of the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967 (OPT),  including measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and from its adoption of related discriminatory legislation and measures?

Second, how do these Israeli policies and practices affect the legal status of the occupation, and what are the legal consequences that arise for all States and the UN from that status?<

On 19 July 2024, 20 years and 10 days since the ICJ rendered its Wall advisory opinion, the world court delivered a bombshell. All ICJ judges agreed that the above questions fall with the court’s jurisdiction and all but one of the 15 judges (Vice-President Sebitunde) decided that the court should comply with the request for an advisory opinion (given it has discretion whether to do so). The same resounding majority found that ‘Israel is under an obligation to cease immediately all new settlement activities, and to evacuate all settlers from the OPT’ and that it ‘has the obligation to make reparation for the damage caused to all the natural or legal persons concerned in the OPT’.

A smaller yet significant majority, 11-4 (Vice-President Sebitunde joined by judges Tomka, Abraham, and Aurescu) found that ‘Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is unlawful’ and that it ‘is under an obligation to bring to an end its unlawful presence in the OPT as rapidly as possible’. The court reached this conclusion in light of the violation of two key principles of international law: the prohibition of the acquisition of territory by force and the right of peoples (in this case, the Palestinian people) to self-determination. The aims and realities of the settlement project in cementing Israel’s presence in the OPT rendering the occupation’s temporariness a façade, and in instituting a discriminatory regime whereby two populations, Israelis and Palestinians, living in the same occupied territory, are subject to different legal regimes, played a crucial role in the court’s determination that the entire Israeli presence in the OPT has become illegal.

When it comes to the responsibilities of other states, by a 12-3 majority (Vice-President Sebitunde joined by judges Abraham and Aurescu) the ICJ found that

‘all States are under an obligation not to recognize as legal the situation arising from the unlawful presence of the State of Israel in the OPT and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by the continued presence of the State of Israel in the OPT’.

They also found that:

‘international organisations, including the United Nations, are under an obligation not to recognise as legal the situation arising from the unlawful presence of the State of Israel in the OPT.’

Finally, they found that:

‘the United Nations, and especially the General Assembly, which requested this opinion, and the Security Council, should consider the precise modalities and further action required to bring to an end as rapidly as possible the unlawful presence of the State of Israel in the OPT.’

This advisory opinion is ground-breaking: by ripping the mask of temporality off the face of Israel’s prolonged occupation, by identifying the settlement project as its core ongoing harm, and by highlighting the critical role the international community (can and must) play in bringing the unlawful situation to a rapid end.

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The European Parliamentary Elections 2024: all EU citizens are equal, but some are more equal than others

Between 6-9 June 2024, nationals of 27 member states are voting in the European Parliamentary elections. These are the first European elections to be held since Brexit: I had the privilege of standing in the South East of England in 2019.

Millions of EU citizens living in the UK are  eligible to vote  in these elections, and many, like myself, will be casting their votes using postal votes, proxy votes, voting in person in  embassies/consulates, and/or e-voting – the available method(s) depending on their member state’s arrangements. In contradistinction, Italians would need to travel back to Italy to vote, despite being able to vote from abroad for national elections, generating justifiable anger.

Worse still, in five EU member states, Ireland, Cyprus, Malta, Denmark, and Bulgaria, national legislation prescribes that most of their citizens residing in a ‘third country’, which the UK now is, are legally disenfranchised. These countries tend to follow the pattern they adopt for their national elections. Of the four nations of the UK, this legal reality is particularly challenging for Northern Ireland, given that, pursuant to the Belfast / Good Friday Agreement, anyone born in NI may choose to be Irish, British, or both; hundreds of thousands of residents of Northern Ireland hold Irish citizenship.

Prior to the conclusion of the withdrawal agreement, I highlighted the ramifications of this scenario. In my role as Chair of the charity ‘New Europeans UK’, we have recently held at Stormont, the seat of the Northern Ireland Assembly, an event entitled ‘EU citizens – rights and wrongs’, which explored the effects of Brexit on voting rights of EU citizens in these European Parliament Elections. The event was co-sponsored by members of several NI political parties, and featured alongside civil society activists a representative of the Irish republic.

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Liberal responses to the government’s farcical (and dangerous) asylum policies

As the government rushes through the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) bill before Parliament, it was encouraging to see its unanimous rejection at York conference, which adopted ‘Beyond Rwanda: a fairer way Forward on Asylum’.

In my speech I highlighted the farce in three stages that is the government’s ‘Rwanda plan’:

First, the government passed the Nationality and Borders Act, creating a two-tier system of refugees (which it never activated), proceeding to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with Rwanda.

Second, the Supreme Court finds the plan to be unlawful.

Third, the government signs a treaty, which the cross-party Lords International Agreements Committee recommends not to ratify until Parliament is satisfied that the protections it provides have been fully implemented. Why? because Parliament is essentially asked to determine that Rwanda is safe even though the Supreme Court has clearly determined it is not.

Lest we forget, in 2023, several asylum seekers received protection in the UK because of their fear of persecution in Rwanda.

The ‘Safety of Rwanda’ Bill is outrageous on multiple levels:

First, the UK, a ‘global north’ country, is paying a ‘global south’ country to both determine asylum applications and to host those of them found to be eligible for asylum – this is a manifest act of counter-responsibility-sharing

Second, unlike EU law, where Article 38 of the Asylum Procedures Directive requires that an asylum seeker sent to a country outside the EU must have a relevant connection to that country, those removed to Rwanda have no such connection

Third, those removed to Rwanda, even if found to be refugees under the Rwandan asylum system, can never come back to the UK: they face a lifetime ban for daring to seek asylum here.

Fourth, the government admits on the face of the bill, as it must under section 19 of the Human Rights Act, that it is unable to state that the bill is compatible with the ECHR; it proceeds to authorise ministers to ignore an interim order by the Strasbourg court to prevent removals; and it expects civil servants to go ahead with such prohibited removals

Finally and to top it all, the government tells our courts they cannot make a determination that Rwanda is unsafe even if the facts so require

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The attacks on Southern Israel – a personal perspective

This time, it’s personal. My nephew’s fiancé‘s family was in hiding all day in a small room in Kibbutz Magen in Southern Israel that was attacked by Hamas. They survived after fierce fighting. Others were not so fortunate. Hundreds of civilians were murdered, many of whom teenagers and young adults who were at an overnight rave and were machine-gunned.

Other civilians were taken hostage. The clips of an elderly woman and a gun-shot naked young woman being paraded by Hamas and cheered in the streets of Gaza are sickening. There is a video circulating which shows toddlers harassing a 3 year-old Israeli boy who is held hostage. A woman was taken hostage with her two very young daughters. A teenage girl was shown bleeding, hands tied behind her back, dragged out of a vehicle. You cannot watch this and not be repulsed.

And, of course, there are ongoing rocket attacks, in their thousands, directed at major civilian populations – not inadvertently or recklessly but deliberately seeking to cause civilian casualties.

This concerted attack on civilians in their homes and cities is vile; the responsibility lies squarely not just with Hamas, a proscribed organisation for good reason, but with its regional supporters.

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West Bank settlements, Liberal values, and our Israeli sister party: time for a realignment

Our Autumn Conference passed a motion entitled ‘Towards a lasting peace in Israel and Palestine’. Critically, the motion was amended, calling for legislation ‘to cease trade with illegal settlements, unless and until a negotiated peace settlement is reached’. Speaking for this amendment, I argued that the UK has obligations under international humanitarian law to refrain in any manner from supporting illegal settlements and must therefore cease trading with them; and that if we are to retain the hope of reaching a two-state solution, it is critical to reject a one-state reality and uphold the legal – and moral – distinction between pre-1967 Israel and the occupied territories.

The illegality of settlements is unequivocal: the International Court of Justice in its Wall Opinion held that the transfer of Israeli civilian population into the occupied territories through the construction of settlements breaches Article 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention. This legal position was endorsed by the UN Security Council in Resolution 2234, which the UK supported. The motion originally proposed merely to label settlement products, but that did not go far enough: while enabling consumers to make informed choices, labelling still allows products to be sold, despite being produced in illegal settlements. Only by refraining from trade will the UK be desisting from active cooperation with the settlement project, and thus fulfilling its obligation to ensure respect for the Geneva Conventions.

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The European ‘refugee crisis’ and the UK’s responsibilities

More than 65.3 million people are displaced globally, including 21.3 million refugees (UNHCR data); yet the vast majority are in ‘Global South’ countries. The ‘refugee crisis’ in Europe is really a crisis of solidarity.

It is a story of the inequity of the Dublin regulation, which operates as a counter-burden sharing mechanism between frontier countries, such as Italy and Greece, and far-flung places such as the UK. Britain opted into Dublin (which enables it to return asylum-seekers to their first port of EU entry) whilst opting out of other components of the Common European Asylum …

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