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Hamas is suing the British Government for violating its human rights. That’s not a joke — or rather it is, but on the British public. The Palestinian terrorist organisation has launched a legal challenge against the Home Office’s decision to proscribe it for being a terrorist organisation, a move it claims violates its rights to freedom of speech and protest. As a showcase for the increasingly obvious absurdities of Britain’s current system, it really is hard to beat.

First, it has shown once again the shameless double standard demanded by certain lawyers. They simultaneously tout their association with various causes and denounce anybody who criticises those associations as undermining the so-called “cab rank rule”, referring to the standard whereby a barrister has to accept the next case that comes along. Such objections are especially specious in this case. For one thing, the cab rank principle only applies to barristers, not solicitors’ firms. Moreover, the cause is usually at least a broad-spectrum defence of human rights per se rather than explicit support for a particular group, as Riverway Law appears to have advertised. But it also highlights a problem with the broader system. Because if we take the official logic of human rights at face value, the mere fact of Hamas’s suit — if not perhaps the actual legal case — is not absurd at all.