UK citizens who fight in Israeli army should be prosecuted, Baroness Warsi says

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  • Muslim baroness decries ’loophole’ that allows UK Jews to join IDF | The Times of Israel
    By Jenni Frazer March 30, 2017
    http://www.timesofisrael.com/muslim-baroness-decries-loophole-that-allows-uk-jews-to-join-idf

    LONDON — A once-prominent British politician has come under fire by Jewish and Conservative leaders for likening British citizens in the Israel Defense Forces to Muslims who join paramilitary and terrorist groups.

    Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, who resigned from the government in 2014 after calling its policy towards Israel “morally indefensible,” made the new inflammatory statement in a March 29 interview with Middle East Eye (MEE) ahead of the launch of her new book, “The Enemy Within.”

    Before she stepped down, Warsi was chairman of the Conservative Party and Foreign Office minister, which made her the highest-achieving Muslim politician in the country.

    In the interview this week with MEE, Warsi complained of a “loophole designed to protect Israel” and said that “the only reason we allow the loophole to exist is because of the IDF, because we are not brave enough to say if you hold British citizenship, you make a choice. You fight for our state only.”

    In the interview with MEE, Warsi said that she asked the Foreign Office about distinctions between state and non-state militaries. Those who joined paramilitary groups, Warsi claimed, were prosecuted upon their return to Britain. She felt the same laws should apply to those who fought for state armies such as Israel’s.

    “If you go out there and fight for any group, you will be subject to prosecution when you get back. If you go out and fight for Assad, I presume, under our law, that is okay. That can’t be right,” said Warsi.

    Public debate, she believed, focused “exclusively on demanding loyalty from British Muslims.”

    “The same rule should apply to all,” she said. “Let’s shut down this loophole. If you don’t fight for Britain, you do not fight.”(...)

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    UK citizens who fight in Israeli army should be prosecuted, Baroness Warsi says

    Britons can currently join the IDF through the ’Mahal’ program

    Shehab Khan | 9 hours ago
    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-citizens-fight-israeli-army-idf-mahal-prosecuted-baroness-sayeeda-