Sir Keir Starmer has faced criticism for celebrating the return of activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah to the UK from detention in Egypt after past social media posts resurfaced.
Mr Abd El-Fattah, who is a British-Egyptian dual national, was detained in Egypt in September 2019, before he was sentenced to five years in prison in December 2021 on charges of spreading false news.
UN investigators branded his imprisonment a breach of international law and he was released this September after being pardoned by Egyptian president Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, before returning to the UK on 26 December following extensive lobbying from Conservative and Labour governments.
The prime minister said on Friday that he was “delighted” that Mr Abd El-Fattah had been reunited with his loved ones in the UK.
“[They] must be feeling profound relief,” Sir Keir wrote on X (formerly Twitter). He added: “I want to pay tribute to Alaa’s family, and to all those that have worked and campaigned for this moment.”
However, posts dating back to 2010 have since emerged, in which the activist appears to call for violence towards “Zionists” and the police, leading to figures such as Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage to demand an investigation into revoking the activist’s British citizenship.
Mr Abd El-Fattah has issued an “unequivocal” apology for the content of the posts, attributing them to “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”.
Who is Alaa Abd El-Fattah?
Mr Abd El-Fattah comes from a family of activists and writers. He was granted UK citizenship in December 2021 under Boris Johnson, reportedly through his UK-born mother Laila Soueif.
The blogger and political activist was a leading voice in Egypt’s 2011 Arab Spring uprising, which led to the ousting of autocrat Hosni Mubarak, and went on hunger strikes behind bars.
He became one of Egypt’s most prominent political prisoners, having spent most of his adult life in jail on what human rights groups said were trumped-up charges.
While imprisoned, he missed the birth of his son, Khaled, and also the death of his father Ahmed Seif al-Islam, who was a human rights lawyer.
His family advocated for his release for years, with his mother undertaking lengthy hunger strikes, camping outside 10 Downing Street, and eventually meeting Sir Keir earlier this year to lobby on her son’s behalf.
Mr Abd El-Fattah’s criticism of the crackdown on dissent after the then-General Sisi seized power that led to his longest prison sentence. In 2014, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for protesting without permission – later reduced to five years.
He was released in 2019 but remained on parole. Later that year, he was arrested again and accused of spreading false news after sharing a social media post about a prisoner’s death. He was jailed for five years.
After he finished his full term in 2024, his mother stepped up her campaign but prosecutors decided to discount the year he had spent in pre-trial detention and insisted he should remain in custody until January 2027.
Numerous international campaigns called for his release and his name was removed from Egypt’s “terrorism” list earlier this year, paving the way for the end of his detention.
Labour’s Conservative predecessors in government had also lobbied for the release of Mr Abd El-Fattah.
The row over past social media posts
Mr Abd El-Fattah apologised for the content of his posts on Monday, saying: “I am shaken that, just as I am being reunited with my family for the first time in 12 years, several historic tweets of mine have been republished and used to question and attack my integrity and values, escalating to calls for the revocation of my citizenship.”
He added: “Looking at the tweets now – the ones that were not completely twisted out of their meaning – I do understand how shocking and hurtful they are, and for that I unequivocally apologise.”
Following the release of the statement, shadow home secretary Chris Philp branded Mr Abd El-Fattah a “scumbag”, adding he was “not really interested” in his apology.
Downing Street has condemned the tweets but defended his entry into the UK, as Sir Keir’s spokesperson said: “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.”
He continued: “That is central to Britain’s commitment to religious and political freedom.
“That said, it doesn’t change the fact that we have condemned the nature of these historic tweets, and we consider them to be abhorrent, and we’ve been very clear about that.”
Sir Keir was “not aware of the historical tweets” until after the activist entered the UK, Downing Street said.
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