It’s no great secret that free speech culture isn’t exactly flourishing in Great Britain. The latest victims of British censorship are Hasan Piker and Cenk Uygur, the inflammatory Hamas apologists from the United States, who are being given the same treatment as the far-right supporters of Tommy Robinson who were barred last month. The UK’s Home Office said it withdrew their permission of Piker and Uygur to enter the country because their presence “may not be conducive to the public good.”
Piker, Uygur, and their defenders naturally rushed to blame Britain’s decision on Israel. Without a shred of evidence, anti-Zionist activist and sometime journalist Glenn Greenwald claimed the entry denial was “solely because they criticize and oppose the one country deemed sacred and off-limits.” Uygur said his criticism of Israel was likewise the culprit, while Piker said his ban was “at the behest of Israel.”
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The suggestion that Israel is “sacred and off-limits” to criticism in the UK or anywhere else is, of course, laughable. For one thing, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmoud—the government minister responsible for the decision—has long been an outspoken critic of the Jewish state. And it’s not like Piker is hardly some low-key supporter of Palestinian rights. He has claimed that Israel is far worse than Hamas, justified both the October 7 and September 11 attacks, and is now the subject of a U.S. inquiry into his recent trips to Cuba and China, where he used social media to evangelize on behalf of the totalitarian regimes.
