Britain produced these murderous extremists so we should try them
WHAT do you think should happen to captured British jihadis? Specifically to the two from London suspected of being surviving members of the murderous Islamic State cell dubbed “The Beatles” because of their British accents.
If Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh are guilty of even a fraction of the things they stand accused of, there will be a welcoming committee of Nazi concentration camp guards waiting to greet them at the gates of Hell.
“The Beatles” – who included “Jihadi John”, the grotesque sadist who (before he was vaporised in an allied air strike) delighted in performing beheadings on helpless, shackled aid workers, were notorious for their cruelty even among other IS terrorists.
The British group is suspected THERE’S a wonderfully evocative scene to a bygone age in the classic 1950s movie White Christmas. Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney and Vera Ellen are all aboard a sleeper train bound for New England from Florida. They’re sitting in the dining car, all silver service, attentive waiters and tempting menus.
Well, we’ve discovered you can get the White Christmas experience here in the UK in the 21st century! We caught the lunchtime train from London to ON-LINE abusers have been targeting Call The Midwife’s Helen George after she dared to put a few pounds on while pregnant. The trolls pounced (“Helen George is massive. She should be put on a diet” was typical).
But Helen – who plays Trixie Franklin – fired back: “I chose not to starve myself in a selfish act to look good on TV.”
You shouldn’t have even bothered responding, chuck – there’s nothing these attention-seeking idiots loathe more than a withering silence. of torture and the beheadings of nearly 30 hostages including Britons and Americans.
Kotey, 34, and Elsheikh, 29, were caught trying to escape Syria by US-backed Kurdish forces. They were chucked into a holding pen along with captured jihadi fighters from Russia, Europe, China, Japan and Arab countries. What they all have in common, apart from their murderous fanaticism, is that none of their home countries wants them back – including ours.
There has been talk about a war crimes trial at The Hague, and a short-lived hope that the Americans will take them off everyone’s hands and leave them to rot in Guantanamo Bay. But Washington has made it clear they believe foreign IS fighters should go on trial in their country of origin.
I completely agree. We have the Cornwall and believe it or not the traditional Pullman car dining service is still going strong. It’s like stepping back half a century, in the best criminal legal system in the world and Kotey and Elsheikh should be seen to have trials of impeccable fairness, not become martyrs of Guantanamo and a rallying point for further extremism.
In any case the men’s victims included British nationals and their families. Lord Carlile QC, an expert on counterterrorism laws, says this makes Britain the “proper forum” for the pair to stand trial.
Yes, but I see it as rather more than that: like it or not, we produced them so we should take responsibility for what happens to them.
Admittedly there is a legal problem: the men were stripped of their UK citizenship after joining IS. Fine: so give it back to them, fly them here and put them in the dock.
And be quick about it before they escape to kill another day.
stepping back to the elegance of a bygone age
best possible way. White linen cloths, thickly folded cotton napkins, shining cutlery, gleaming glasses and smartly uniformed attendants.
The three-course menu – surprisingly inexpensive – was excellent. There’s something indescribably romantic about eating your lunch in a proper old-fashioned restaurant car, especially when the sea starts to flash past the carriage windows once you reach Dawlish.
Sure beats trying to eat a cheese sandwich and swilling a bottle of lager in the buffet. CLASSIC: Train travel in 1954 film White Christmas