A Palestinian student who said she was ‘full of pride’ after Hamas launched its attack on Israel claims the Home Office has revoked her visa on the grounds of ‘national security’.
Dana Abuqamar, 19, a law student at the University of Manchester, attended a pro-Palestine protest just one day after Hamas carried out its October 7 attack.
During the demonstration, Ms Abuqamar, president of Manchester Friends of Palestine, was filmed saying she was ‘really full of joy’ and ‘proud that Palestinian resistance has come to this point’.
She has now claimed that the UK Government has ‘violated her human rights’ by rescinding her student visa on the ‘baseless’ accusation that she is a ‘risk to public safety’.
The Home Office told it does not comment on individual cases and it remains unclear precisely what revoking the visa means for the teenager’s future in Britain.
In a new video released this week, Ms Abuqamar confirmed she would be appealing the decision and said her remarks in October, which were publicly condemned by policing minister Chris Philp, had been misrepresented.
‘My words were taken out of context and they were framed as me supporting harm to innocent civilians, which is completely false and completely untrue,’ she told the Middle East Eye.
Dana Abuqamar, 19, a law student at the University of Manchester who said she was ‘full of joy’ after Hamas launched its attack on Israel, claims the Home Office has revoked her visa on the grounds of ‘national security’
Ms Abuqamar, president of Manchester Friends of Palestine, is pictured at a rally the day after Hamas launched its attack on Israel. She said during the demonstration that she was ‘really full of joy’ and ‘proud that Palestinian resistance has come to this point’
‘The UK Home Office decided to revoke my student visa following public statements supporting the Palestinian right to exercise under international law to resist oppression and break through the siege that was illegally placed on Gaza for over 16 years.’
She added: ‘It’s an outrageous claim that the Home Office is making by deeming me a national security threat.
I am a 19-year-old who has done nothing but go to school and advocate for social justice and try and be an asset to my community.
‘So saying I pose a threat to national security is a completely baseless claim.’
She told the news outlet that her legal team had lodged a ‘human rights appeal’ against the decision.
Ms Abuqamar, who is in her final year as a law student, said that before coming to Britain she believed ‘freedom of expression is a fundamental human right that’s cherished here’.
She now feels that this right does ‘not apply to ethnic minorities, particularly Muslims and Palestinians like myself’.
She argued: ‘We must reject the double standard in the application of human rights by public authorities and rise against this oppression.’
A Home Office spokesperson told : ‘It is a longstanding government policy that we do not comment on individual cases.’
Ms Abuqamar said the Government alleged her ‘presence in the UK threatens national security’ and the statements she made in support of Palestine ‘support extremist views’. Pictured is smoke rising from the area after Israeli army launching an airstrike on the Jabalia Refugee Camp of Gaza City on May 15, 2024
Ms Abuqamar, who is in her final year as a law student, previously said that ‘everyone’s in danger in Gaza’ and called on others to ‘condemn the UK’s support for Israel’. Pictured on May 15, 2024 is a community in Khan Yunis, Gaza that was heavily destroyed in the Israeli attacks
Ms Abuqamar first made headlines after she was interviewed by Sky News during a pro-Hamas event in Manchester last October, one day after Hamas’ attack on Israel.
She told the broadcaster: ‘We are full of pride. We are really, really full of joy (at) what has happened…. We are proud that Palestinian resistance has come to this point.’
Days later, she clarified that she had been ‘misrepresented’ and told the BBC: ‘The death of any innocent civilian should not be condoned ever and we don’t condone it at all.’
She added that ‘everyone’s in danger in Gaza’ and even shared that 15 of her relatives had been killed when an Israeli ‘missile was dropped on their three-storey residential building’.
Ms Abuqamar, speaking at another pro-Palestine march, said: ‘We need to make it known that we will not be silenced – that any attacks or any actions or efforts to silence us from standing up against oppression and saying the truth and helping people to see through the propaganda – that won’t work anymore.’
‘We are here to condemn the UK’s support for Israel and its perpetration of war crimes.’