Shamima Begum

 Shamima Begum has made a hideous mistake - make no bones about it. However:

1. She was 15 at the time she fled the UK. Who, as a teenager, hasn't done something stupid? At 15 you don't hate society, you hate your parents. 
2. Everyone deserves a 2nd chance, following punishment proportional to the crime or, preferably, rehabilitation.
3. She is doubtless traumatised by her experiences, as evidenced by the interviews with her.
4. Those who say she expressed no regrets in the interview obviously latched on to the words 'no regrets' without noting the context of those words - they probably got them from the Daily Mail without ever watching the interview. Watch the interview and see the words of those who interviewed her - but note it doesn't match the narrative that the right wing papers want you to believe.
5. Under the Human Rights Convention it is illegal to make someone stateless, unless they are considered a security risk.
6. Without a fair trial and evidence, the judiciary has to go on the advice of the security services and government, who can say whatever they want and do not need to show any evidence whatsoever. It's simply the law as made by Parliament and there have been a good many stupid laws enacted by Parliament - legality is not a guide to morality or common sense. This law rides roughshod over the British system of the presumption of innocence before a fair trial.
7. Sajid Javid could not afford to be seen to do nothing, so he made an arbitrary and populist decision to remove Begum's citizenship - it was a dog whistle call to the Daily Mail Readers and an example of the retributive justice they love so much.
8. As for Begum being a security risk, what's wrong with putting her on remand, where she can be monitored 7 x 24? OK, there's a limit to the time one can be held on remand but, if she has committed an indictable crime, then it should be possible to gather the evidence within the timeframe. 
9. The argument that she would become the focus of Islamist action in the UK holds no water - there were 174 Islamist terrorists in jail in the UK by the end of 2019 and not one of them became the focus of Islamist activity. The wife of a minor jihadi in a UK jail would attract no attention, but if she's all over the news for having her citizenship revoked, it's a gift that keeps giving to the ISIL propaganda machine.
10. Where is the restorative justice in making her stateless? It's a life sentence - murderers get less.
11. Why do we have British terrorists who have actually killed people (Begum, as far as we know, has killed no-one) in our jails and not revoked their citizenship?
12. How is it possible to counter the recruitment of terrorists if you don't talk to those who have been recruited and learn from their experiences?
13. The only possible answer is that Javid wanted to make an example of her, which is, by definition, primitive, arbitrary justice in the interests of politics - he's turned her into a political pawn and I'm waiting for the government to attack the left and centre for being lax on crime, despite the Conservatives presiding over the decimation of police numbers over the last 10 years.
14. How would those on the right feel about Diane Abbott, if she were Home Secretary, arbitrarily deeming one of them a security risk and revoking their citizenship while out of the country, presenting bugger all evidence to support her contention? It's a slippery slope, especially with a government that abhors proper, parliamentary scrutiny of its decisions. You are a British citizen at the whim of the government of the day.
15. All we have done is hand the problem over to our allies - the Kurds - who have enough on their plate. A fine way to treat allies.
16. Imagine the reverse, where a nation revokes the citizenship of one of their nationals who commits a crime (which may not be a crime here) while they're in the UK. We'd be left with the problem and be unable to deport him or her. Would those Daily Mail Readers be happy with that situation? The British government is setting a dangerous precedent.

I believe this will come back to bite the government in the bum. The use of revocation of citizenship was introduced in 1981, but beefed up dramatically and controversially in 2014 by Theresa May as Home Secretary as part of the Hostile Environment policy, which led to Windrush.

Since then, denial of citizenship has skyrocketed from a handful of cases as the Conservatives pander to the Islamophobes in their ranks.

It's worth noting that the botched, US led coalition that invaded Iraq and created a power vacuum is directly responsible for the creation of ISIL in the first place.

I note that, in another dog whistle to the Daily Mail Readers, Priti Patel is considering life sentences for people smuggling. The fact is that people smuggling is a high profit, low risk business and few are caught. The smugglers are in the background and organised (organisation being concept that's entirely alien to this government). They also don't tend to put themselves in danger (a bit like this government), unlike the people they smuggle. It's another policy to make it look as if something is being done while the bulk of the government's activity will remain fixed on the victims of this sad trade.