LONDON: Judges in the UK have ruled that Home Office decisions not to process reunion applications by two families in Gaza without biometric data are “irrational and unreasonable,” and based on guidelines contradicting international humanitarian law.

At an immigration tribunal on April 4, the judges said the Home Office’s stance over the two families contravene their “rights to respect for private and family life.”

One of the families, referred to as RM and others and consisting of two parents and two children, is seeking to be reunited with a third child, a daughter currently studying in the UK.

The second family, known as WM and others, consists of a Palestinian woman with four children seeking to join her brother, who is a UK citizen.

Both families have had to flee their homes in Gaza on account of Israel’s invasion of the enclave, which has left more than 32,000 people dead since Oct. 7, according to local health authorities.

The judgement found that Home Office guidance, which requires “evidence that a person faces a personal risk of harm, ‘which is separate to the level of risk faced by the wider population’,” is in breach of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Judge Jackson said: “We do not consider that in the context of the conflict in Gaza … that it is necessary for a person to show that they are specifically targeted to be able to establish that they are at risk due to their personal circumstances.”

Both families, who say they lack food and medical supplies in Gaza, requested for the Home Office to decide on their applications before submitting biometric data due to the challenges in submitting it in the middle of a war zone.

The nearest reliable center for submitting such data for use in a visa application is in Cairo in neighboring Egypt. 

The Home Office refused the request, saying their situations were not “compelling as to make them exceptional” or “different to other people in Gaza.”

Cecilia Correale, a solicitor at the Islington Law Centre, which brought the cases against the Home Office on behalf of the families, along with the Migrants’ Law Project at Asylum Aid, told The Guardian: “This is an important judgment with wider consequences which recognises that the Home Office has adopted policies in breach of Article 8 ECHR which it is applying to multiple families seeking to be reunited.”

A spokesperson for the Gaza Families Reunited campaign told the newspaper: “The Home Office must now urgently rectify its policy and approach to ensure that family members of Palestinians in the UK who are eligible for reunification under existing routes are actually able to exercise their rights.”

A Home Office spokesperson told The Guardian: “We have received the outcome of the judicial review proceedings and are considering the impact. It would be inappropriate to comment further.”