Denied entry at Ben Gurion Airport

These are not my words, but those of a group from the UK who were coming to Israel as tourists arriving at Ben Gurion recently. Some members of the group were pulled aside, interrogated for hours, denied the right to use the phone and then deported. Their whole experience, the way they were treated, the questions they were asked and the racist comments made by officials show how Israel is increasing its policy of denying entry to internationals under the guise of security and particularly to Muslim tourists. There is also a very detailed account of the same experience with a few photos at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/reway2007/4104895983/

12 November 2009, Ben Gurion Airport , Tel Aviv

My recollection of events concurs with that which has already been recorded in terms of the general order of events. I just need to add that within minutes of getting off the plane, as I walked along with all the other passengers towards immigration, an official picked me out of the crowd and asked to see my passport and asked me why I had come. She gave me back my passport and I continued to the immigration desk. As soon as I handed over my passport I was told to wait to one side and then sent over to the waiting area for questioning.

Regarding my interrogation, it went along the following lines, to the best of my memory, with one woman asking all the questions, and another beside her recording things and working in front of a PC.

Official: Why are you here? What is the purpose of your visit?

Me: to visit the Holy sites, as a pilgrim, as a tourist.

Official: Where will you be visiting?

Me: Jerusalem , Bethlehem , Hebron.

Official: What will you be doing?

Me: Visiting the different sites.

Official: What? All this time? What is there to see?

Me: listing various sites – e.g. Al-Aqsa,

Official: Then what? Is that it? One week and just visiting these sites? What is there? It is boring?

You are a Muslim, right? Have you been Hajj (pilgrimage), how many times? It is nice, yes? Mecca, Medina. Why don’t you go there instead? It is boring here, so what you pray in al-Aqsa, then what?

She continued: Where else are you going? Gaza? West Bank? Maybe you want to go to Gaza, see the damage there?

She repeated many of the questions and said at one stage that: “you are a Muslim, right? So you must tell the truth”.

She asked me about the others on the trip. Did I know them all? I replied that I did, except for the 2 who were the work friends of another colleague. I responded that I had a licensed guide and tour company, that I had booked into the Capitol Hotel for the whole stay, that they could check out the tour company and the driver/guide was waiting outside. I told her my plan and she went through each day. I showed her my itinerary from my previous visit just under 12 months ago.

She asked me about my work. I explained that I was a community worker, and I arrange sporting and social activities, and this was one of them. She looked through my trip folder and took down the names and details of every contact there. She asked me who I knew. She saw the correspondence that I had with Sheikh Bukhari and Eliyahu (a Jew) and asked who they were. I explained that the Sheik runs the Uzbek Cultural Centre. She asked what that had do with anything. I explained that they were people I knew and that where we come from there are many different cultures and we are interested in learning about different people. She enquired who was ‘Jane’. I said that this was someone in England. She commented that I was well organised. I said that I had to be. It was my responsibility for all 9 of us to have a good experience, time was limited and such a trip must be organised properly.

She asked me about how much money I had. I took out what I had in my pockets, and hand luggage, and showed her that which was my personal money, and that which was the group travel money, tour operators money, as well as some money which people had given me to distribute in different ways (charity for poor people/donation to the mosque). Most of it was labelled clearly.

During the questioning the other lady had my phone and was going through all the contacts. Her general attitude was sarcastic, abrupt and arrogant. I have been interrogated on my previous visits in 1997 and 2008, so I expected some questioning. However, on those occasions they generally asked the questions in a decent fact-finding manner, and did not treat me like a criminal. I left this interview feeling deeply offended.

About 2am in the morning we asked to use the phone to call the British Embassy but they refused to let us use a phone. One other group member and I used our own phones and made calls (very costly!). I called the driver and guide who was waiting on the other side for over 7 hours and told them to return and explained that we were returning to the UK. For years I have been involved in local strategies to prevent extremism and encourage respect and understanding between different people. The ‘security’ reasoning that they gave for our deportation was highly insulting and derogatory and implies that we are up to no good.

“We live like monkeys”, Weds 28 October 09

The story of the families living on the street outside their house that they were evicted from on 2 August, continues to get worse. The two families - Hanoun and Al Ghawi were both evicted to make room for Israeli Jewish settler families to move in when the courts ruled that the houses should be ‘returned’ to Jewish ownership.

The Al Ghawi family was given an order by the police to dismantle the tents they were living in by last Sunday. Today about 80 police and soldiers arrived to pull the tents down. They arrived while the women were making breakfast in the tent. The police surrounded the tent and ordered the women to take their belongings out. Then they tore it down. The children were screaming and the women crying. An eye witness who had been there the whole time said that the soldiers were laughing as they pulled the tent down.

When the police left, the family used a piece of the torn tent to cover the tree for a makeshift shelter and to hold it in place with a pole. Within a few minutes the police came back and tore that down too. Now the family live under the tree with no shelter. Winter is coming, yesterday it rained hard in Jerusalem and the temperature has plummeted.

Last week there were a series of attacks and provocations by the settlers towards the Al Ghawi family. On Shabbat last Friday the settlers came at sunset to sing and dance outside the tent. Someone told me that the Palestinian women took their pots and pans and also started banging them! The previous Tuesday one of the settlers came to the tent and told the family to leave - he told them that it was his house. A fight broke out, the police arrived and arrested one of the Al Ghawi men. He was detained for 48 hours and has been ordered not to go within 1km of his house for 15 days. Now he sleeps in his car down the road. “It’s 2010” he said, “and a lot of us live like monkeys. I just want to go back to my home”.

Another man from the Al Ghawi family was suspected of having a heart attack. He was taken to hospital and when he returned a few days later, the police came to arrest him also. None of the settlers were detained or arrested.

Both the Hanoun and Al Ghawi families have been living in their homes since 1956 when as refugees after the 1948 Nakba (catastrophe), they were given the houses by UNRWA. It’s been a very long story for both the families, with lawyers involved and previous periods of evictions from the houses. They have papers that date back many years that prove this particular land is Arab land. The Municipality of Jerusalem ordered the destruction and confiscation of the tent that had provided shelter to the family since their eviction in early August. Twenty five other families are in similar situations. I spoke to one man who has had his court case postponed from last June until January 2010, for the judge to consider key documents. His family has also been living in the house since 1956 and he will find out in January if he is to face the same fate as the Al Ghawi and Hanoun families.

A few days have passed since I wrote this. Today is Tuesday 3 November. This morning following a court dismissal another family were forced out of a section of their home. 40 settlers accompanied by large private security forces summoned by the settlers, forcefully evicted 30 people from the Al-Kurd family out of their home. The family's belongings were thrown onto the street while the settlers invaded the Al-Kurd home. Later on police forces arrived to protect the settlers and arrested an international activist. The court permitted the settlers to enter the house and take over this section as a part of a forced agreement between the settlers and the family 17 years ago which recognises the settlers ownership of the land due to Jewish ownership prior to 1948. This decision of the court is discriminatory by nature as the Palestinian residents of the neighbourhood are all refugees from the 1948 war but can never reclaim their lands because they are Palestinian.

There is a protest vigil tomorrow but it feels so hopeless…