This week it was reported that Shamima Begum, 19, from London, made a request to the British government to be allowed to return to the UK following the deaths of son Jerah and daughter Sarayah.
The British teenager fled the UK four years ago aged 15 to join ISIS in Syria and was tracked down to a refugee camp. She explained to British reporters how her two previous children had both died of illness and malnutrition – and as a result stated that said she “could not endure anymore“.
Shamima Begum was one of three schoolgirls (alongside friends Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase) – who left the UK to marry ISIS fighters in Syria in February 2015.
Ms Begum revealed how both her children had died due to lack of medical provision and the wars that were taking place in the country. Now nine months pregnant, she said she now wants to return to Britain to raise her third child.
Although her husband had requested that she stay, she said for the safety of her child she felt compelled to return to the UK that she “could quietly live with [her] child.”
Despite the horrors and terror, she witnessed, Ms Begum states that she had no regrets over joining the Islamic State forces in Syria and even seeing the head of victims in a bin did not faze her.
At the same time here in Britain, we saw dozens of Jamaicans, many of residents here for decades, some only months old, forcibly removed from the UK by the British government.
The decision to deport 30 people back to Jamaica was allegedly made following criminal offences committed by said individuals, some of which were not serious offences. According to the Independent news, ‘At least seven men who were due to be deported on a charter flight to Jamaica have been granted a last-minute reprieve… ‘ but for seven men, their ‘… deportations were halted after lawyers intervened.’
Some of the deportees are reported to have children of their own, and other family members, who are British citizens, whom they have left behind. Most will return to a country they may have little or no recollection of, having left as little children or even babies, and some will have no relatives or friends living in Jamaica.
The experiences of both Begum and the deportees are two sides of one coin, citizenship. The rights that’s accompany citizenship can often be taken for granted until in dispute. The right to live, work, vote, receive benefits as well as pay taxes.
Regardless of our personal views of each of those involved, whether Begum or those who have/are experiencing deportation, what is clear is that where there is injustices we must stand against it.
Imprisoned in a jail in Birmingham, Alabama USA in 1963 Dr Martin Luther King Jr wrote a letter in which he writes, Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
Learn to do good; Seek justice, Reprove the ruthless, Defend the orphan, Plead for the widow. Isaiah 1:17
This week may we do all we can to challenge the injustice faced by others today, so that tomorrow they will not be our portion or that of our loved ones.