Priti Patel: When Treachery Becomes a ‘Rewardable’ Offence

American Herald Tribune – by Hafsa Kara-Mustapha

Boris Johnson’s role as prime minister was always going to prove controversial. The man is known as a self-serving compulsive liar a cheat and inept. Hardly the required qualities to lead a country let alone an industrial nation facing its most challenging political transition in recent history.

But controversy, as it appears, will be the hallmark of a Boris premiership.  As names of potential cabinet members started circulating in the media, on the eve of his ‘induction’ by the Tory party, one in particular stuck out and for all the wrong reasons. 

Boris was looking to appoint Priti Patel, to one of the most senior positions in the cabinet, Home Office secretary. This highly sensitive position means that security and intelligence will be overseen by her office yet this is the same woman that was sacked 18 months ago for secret meetings she held with Israeli officials.

This was all the more shocking considering the meeting with the most senior figures of the Israeli political class remained undisclosed with none of their contents shared with the British diplomatic staff in Tel Aviv. Her boss, former Prime Minister Theresa May, was left red-faced when she met her Israeli counterpart while having no knowledge one of her own cabinet ministers had held meetings with him just a few months prior. When the story broke, the damage was such that she was forced to resign. Under any other circumstance and had the foreign officials been from any other country, Patel would have not only been sacked on the spot (May initially had a firm discussion with her before finally accepting her position was untenable) but faced an internal investigation with possible charges brought against her.  This was hardly an insignificant mistake of a casual chance meeting between two politicians; these were a series of meetings held in secret with high ranking officials of a foreign state. To this day, nothing has transpired on the nature of the meetings though we know Patel is a committed Zionist with strong ties to Israel.  No doubt any other politician meeting in secret with Russian, Iranian or even EU officials would be investigated and face possible suspension from their political party for gross misconduct. But Patel met with Israeli officials who in turn flagrantly flaunted diplomatic protocol by keeping them under wraps from a supposed close ally.

If possible treason wasn’t a valid enough reason to bring an end to a political career than what would? But Patel’s transgression hasn’t just been excused, it has now been rewarded.

Furthermore, the media have been prompt to downplay the controversial aspect of her appointment pointing only to her very right-wing politics as a source of possible concern.

The BBC’s John Pienaar casually referred to her sacking as a result of ‘straying off policy.’ A modern-day euphemism for misleading, lying and possibly betraying your country and prime minister.

Of course the climate in Britain surrounding the issue of Israel is such that the media are careful not to point to misconduct for fear of incurring the wrath of the all-powerful pro Israel lobby who have, since Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader, gone into overdrive to denounce any critic of the Jewish state as an anti-Semite, a term that has been used to force several respectable left-wing politicians out of their jobs.

Patel is in a highly privileged position because, as things currently stand in what is increasingly totalitarian Britain, any friend of Israel is sheltered from criticism.

The new Home Secretary clearly played the long game when she aligned herself with major Israeli figures and their acolytes in the British establishment namely leaders from the Board of British Jews ( UK equivalent of Aipac) as well as Conservative Friends of Israel who have cloaked her with a shield of impunity for her past and future misdemeanors. It is particularly glaring that at a time when LGBT lobbyists who compete with their pro-Israel counterparts in dominating political narratives and censoring free speech in Britain, have been silent about Patel’s new role despite her known opposition to gay marriage, something that would not go unchallenged in particular from ethnic minority figures.  Patel has also expressed support for the death penalty and despite being a first-generation Briton and daughter of Asian refugees Uganda, opposes non-EU immigration, underlying her own contradictions and striking hypocrisy.

Boris’ brazen choice in bringing into his team an unsavory right-wing character with lacking morals and questionable loyalty to Britain is telling about the man who views the role as one designed to serve his own personal ambition over the future of the country he serves. This is a man who after all boasted of having American citizenship that could even afford him a possible US presidency only to renounce it when faced with a hefty tax bill from the IRS.  When questioned about his blatant Islamophobia, Johnson routinely cites his Turkish great grandfather who escaped the Ottoman Empire before being captured and executed for high treason, as a supposed mitigating factor for his bigotry.

Perhaps that in itself reveals much about Johnson’s affection for Mizz Patel, treason after all runs in his family, there’s no reason why it should be absent from his cabinet.

https://ahtribune.com/world/europe/uk/3337-priti-patel-treachery.html