Customs officers who separated out El Al passengers to search their baggage as they passed through the Nothing to Declare channel, have been accused of harassing and discriminating against Jews and Israelis, in breach of the UK Equality Act.
On Sunday 10 June at around 10.30pm, passengers from an El Al flight, the vast majority of whom were either Jewish and/or Israeli, were passing through the “nothing to declare” channel heading for the exit. Passengers on an incoming flight from Doha were also passing through the channel at the same time.
A customs officer noticed an Israeli flag on one of the passenger’s luggage. He, along with all the rest of the passengers from the El Al flight, were picked out and asked into a separate room, where their luggage was scanned.
A passenger told UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI):
“We were walking towards the exit when a customs official appeared and asked a man in front of me what he had on his suitcase. The man replied that it was an Israeli flag. Immediately the customs official started shouting that everyone on the Israeli flight must go to the room on the left.
One traveller said ‘why us?’ The official didn’t reply. Another traveller said: ‘We are Jewish, why are you doing this to us?’ The official said ‘I am a customs officer and I can do whatever I want.’
“It was a horrible feeling to be shunted into another room. There were two officers in the hallway – one man and one woman. The woman also said ‘we can do whatever we want.’ In the other room there was a scanning machine. We had to take our luggage off our trolleys and another official put everyone’s cases through the machine. Then we were allowed to leave.”
Another passenger on the same flight wrote a complaint to the Border Police after his experience on Sunday evening. He said in his letter:
“I was very unpleasantly surprised to be very suddenly hurled aside with all other passengers from my flight from Israel. The officer gave no explanation, prevented anyone that came from Israel from coming through and forced us all to have all our baggages checked. Even the other officers were smiling uncomfortably saying “I don’t know why she did that”.
I was carrying a backpack and a 12kg suitcase, others were carrying bags of various shapes and sizes. It was just discriminatory towards anyone coming from Israel, with no warning and no explanation…... I feel sickened by this totally un called for check at 11pm on a Sunday evening.”
The passengers felt harassed and subjected to degrading treatment simply because they were Jewish.
According to s.29(6) of the Equality Act 2010 (“the Act”), a person must not, in the exercise of a public function do anything that constitutes discrimination, harassment or victimisation.
UKLFI has written to Sir Matthew Rycroft, Permanent Secretary at the Home Office, which runs the Border Force, to ask for an investigation into the behaviour of the Border Force officers at Heathrow.
On 12.6.24 the Border Police issued this statement:
“It is categorically untrue to report that passengers were detained upon arrival into Heathrow on Sunday evening. Border Force Heathrow target late night flights looking for prohibited and restricted goods as part of Border Security work, and on Sunday passengers from various flights were spoken to by Border Force Officers and had their bags X-rayed as is routine.”
Updated 12.6.24