UK Home Office rejects Hamas application to overturn terror list ban
The British government has rejected an application by the Palestinian group Hamas to remove it from the UK's list of banned terrorist organisations.
A Home Office spokesperson confirmed on Thursday that Hamas remains on the government's list of proscribed groups.
“The government keeps the list of proscribed organisations under regular review," the spokesperson said in a statement.
"While we do not routinely comment on individual groups that are proscribed, we can confirm that Harakat al-Muqawamah (Hamas) is still listed as a proscribed organisation.”
Earlier this year, Mousa Abu Marzouk, head of Hamas' Foreign Relations Office, instructed lawyers to appeal against the decision by former UK Home Secretary Priti Patel in 2021 to proscribe the group in its entirety.
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Hamas' military wing, the Qassam Brigades, was proscribed by the UK more than two decades ago. However, Patel extended the ban to include the entire organisation, arguing there was no longer a meaningful distinction between its political and military wings.
Fahad Ansari, director of Riverway Law - which has since rebranded as Riverway to the Sea - led the challenge.
Daniel Grutters, a barrister at One Pump Court Chambers, and Franck Magennis, a barrister at Garden Court Chambers, submitted a 106-page application to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper.
The application argued that the 2021 decision "pursued explicitly political objectives by a politically compromised Secretary of State".
The legal team stressed that Hamas did not pay them or any of the experts and lawyers who contributed evidence to the submission, as it is illegal to receive funds from a designated terrorist organisation.
In its application, Hamas argued that the proscription hinders the group's ability to broker a political solution to the conflict, stifles discussions aimed at securing a long-term settlement, and criminalises ordinary Palestinians living in Gaza.
Its submission included expert testimony from Oxford-based Israeli academic Avi Shlaim, who urged the UK to take a "more nuanced position on Hamas" by delisting it as a terror organisation.
The group can now appeal to the Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission, which has the power to overturn the Home Office’s decision if it finds the rejection legally unsound.
When a proscribed group challenges its designation, the home secretary has 90 days to respond. Under Section 4 of the Terrorism Act, any organisation designated as a terrorist group may appeal to have its name removed from the government's list of banned organisations.
Individuals who have been impacted by a group's proscription can also apply to the home secretary to have it deproscribed.
The home secretary also has the discretion to add or remove any group engaged in armed conflict from the proscribed list.
Last week, the High Court upheld the government's decision to proscribe Palestine Action, a direct-action protest group, as a terrorist organisation.
This decision was later upheld again by the UK Court of Appeal in a late-night court hearing.
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