Geneva Abdul

A London surgeon who provided testimony on Israel’s war in Gaza after operating during the conflict has said he feels criminalised after being denied entry to France over the weekend.

Prof Ghassan Abu-Sitta, a plastic and reconstructive surgeon was due to speak on the ongoing war to the French parliament’s upper house on Saturday. However, after arriving at Charles de Gaulle airport north of Paris on on a morning flight from London, he was informed by French authorities that Germany had enforced a Schengen-wide ban on his entry to Europe.

Abu-Sitta said he had no knowledge that German authorities, who had previously refused his entry to Berlin in April, had put an administrative visa ban on him for a year, meaning he was banned from entering any Schengen country.

“What I find most difficult to accept is this complete criminalisation,” Abu-Sitta said on Sunday, adding that he was previously told by authorities he would be unable to enter Germany for the month of April.

“I was put in a holding cell and marched in front of people at Charles de Gaulle with armed guards and then handed over to the staff in the plane, all so that I’m unable to give evidence,” he said.

Instead of taking part in a conference at the French senate to speak about Gaza, on invitation from Green party parliamentarians, Abu-Sitta was stripped of his possessions and taken to a holding cell. Before being deported to the UK, he was able to attend the conference via video on his lawyer’s phone from the detention centre.

“It was critical for me that we do this, that they’re unable to silence us,” said Abu-Sitta, who has worked in Gaza since 2009, as well as in wars in Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.

During October and November 2023, at the beginning of Israel’s war in Gaza which has since killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, Abu-Sitta operated from al-Shifa and al-Ahli Baptist hospitals. During his 43 days, he described witnessing a “massacre unfold” in Gaza and the use of white phosphorus munitions, which Israel has denied.

Abu-Sitta has since provided evidence to Scotland Yard and the international criminal court (ICC) in The Hague. He intends to challenge his entry ban in the German courts and is considering going to the European court of human rights.

In April, Abu-Sitta travelled to Berlin to participate in the Palestine Congress, where he was denied entry by authorities because they “could not ensure the safety of attendees in the conference”, he said. The German federal police have been approached for comment.

His lawyer, Tayab Ali, said the German government issued the Shengan-wide ban without any consultation with Abu-Sitta, and without disclosing the information the ban is based on.

“It is clear to us that there is an organised attempt to discredit medical witnesses and in particular Prof Ghassan from providing details about the consequences of Israel’s military action in Gaza,” said Ali, who is also director at the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP).

“The ban appears to be a cynical attempt to silence eyewitnesses giving testimony to parliamentarians and law enforcement agencies.”

The incident comes after diplomats from G7 nations urged officials at the ICC not to announce war crimes charges against Israel or Hamas officials, amid concerns that such a move could disrupt the chances of a breakthrough in ceasefire talks.

Germany, widely seen as the second largest arms exporter to Israel behind the US, is facing a domestic lawsuit over weapons sales to Israel. Last week, the international court of justice (ICJ) rejected a request by Nicaragua to issue Germany emergency orders to desist selling arms to Israel, but declined to throw out the case altogether.

“The only reason the Germans would want a European-wide ban is to stop me from getting to the Hague,” said Abu-Sitta.

“It communicates to me the complete complicity of the German government in the genocidal war.”

(Source: The Guardian)

Qatar-based network Al Jazeera on Sunday described as “criminal” an Israeli government ban against it for its coverage of the Gaza war.

“We condemn and denounce this criminal act by Israel that violates the human right to access information,” the channel said, adding that it would take legal action.

Al Jazeera said it would “pursue all available legal channels through international legal institutions in its quest to protect both its rights and journalists, as well as the public’s right to information”.

“Israel’s ongoing suppression of the free press, seen as an effort to conceal its actions in the Gaza Strip, stands in contravention of international and humanitarian law,” the broadcaster said.

“Israel’s direct targeting and killing of journalists, arrests, intimidation and threats will not deter Al Jazeera from its commitment to cover,.”

The network’s office in Gaza has been bombed in the conflict and two of its correspondents have been killed.

Al Jazeera said its crew accreditations had been withdrawn and Israel had banned media service providers from transmitting its broadcasts.

(Source: The National)

A group of people staged a demonstration Saturday outside University College London (UCL) in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, where more than 34,000 people have been killed in Israeli attacks since Oct. 7 last year.

The crowd gathered outside UCL’s main building in Bloomsbury, just a few days after roughly a dozen tents were pitched in support of people in Gaza, joining several other campuses across the Western world.

Carrying Palestinian flags, the group chanted slogans, including “terrorist Israel,” referring to the relentless Israeli attacks that have left vast swathes of Gaza in ruins and pushed 85% of the enclave’s population into internal displacement, even as they have faced a crippling blockade on food, clean water, and medicine, according to the UN.

Protesters called for divestment from firms complicit in the “ongoing genocide” in Gaza, and an end to arms shipments to Israel.

Separately, a smaller group held a counter-protest nearby, with police deployed in the area.

At least three protesters have been arrested by police during the protest.

The global wave of pro-Palestinian student demonstrations began on April 17 at Columbia University to protest Israel’s offensive in Gaza, spreading to other Western countries, including the UK.

Israel has waged a deadly military offensive on Gaza since an Oct. 7 Hamas incursion which killed some 1,200 people.

Tel Aviv, in comparison, has killed more than 34,600 Palestinians and wounded nearly 78,000 amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities in the Palestinian territory.

Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which in January issued an interim ruling that ordered Tel Aviv to prevent genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

(Source: AA)

The 15th summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) started on Saturday in the Gambian capital Banjul.

World leaders from the 57 member countries of the OIC and beyond are expected to attend, said the OIC in a statement ahead of the summit. Representing Türkiye at the event is Hakan Fidan, the country’s foreign minister.

It added that the summit aims to strengthen unity “in collectively addressing the pressing challenges facing the Ummah (Muslim community) and expanding cooperation and solidarity among member countries in the pursuit of our shared goals as enshrined in the charter.”

In the opening speech, Gambian President Adama Barrow, who hosted the summit, gave a message of support for Palestine.

Underlining that a solution must be found for Israel’s attacks in Palestine, Barrow said this process has caused endless human destruction for more than 75 years.

The situation of the Palestinians is a source of great concern not only for the Muslim community but for the whole world, Barrow added, stressing the ongoing violence and instability in the region and the humanitarian crises in Gaza seriously threaten regional stability and global peace.

Noting military intervention is not an option, Barrow supports peace and a two-state solution.

He also praised South Africa’s genocidal case against Israel, and said they stand in solidarity with South Africa and those who demand justice and responsibility, and support the search for justice for the victims of the atrocities committed by Israel.

Unity and solidarity

The OIC added that the summit also aims to “expand our domestic economy and revitalise small and medium enterprises,” in addition to “taking the opportunity to share the wealth of Gambian and African culture with the world.”

The summit, taking place through Sunday with the central theme “Enhancing unity and solidarity through dialogue for sustainable development,” will address global issues, notably the current situation in Palestine and the ongoing Israeli war in Gaza, which has killed over 34,000 people.

During the summit, three key documents – a draft Palestinian resolution, draft Banjul statement, and the draft final document – will be presented to the Council of Foreign Ministers and subsequently to the summit for discussion.

(Source: AA)

Western media has lost all semblance of neutrality and has become “part of the problem” when it comes to Israel’s ongoing war crimes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to a Palestinian journalist.

“The Western media is enabling Israel to commit these war crimes and massacres of Palestinians because they refuse to cover what’s actually happening on in the ground,” Ahmed Alnaouq, a Palestinian journalist based in London, told Anadolu.

“It’s very loud and clear that Western media is now a hypocrite when it comes to this war on Gaza.”

Alnaouq has had more than 23 family members killed in Israel’s ongoing assault on Gaza, including his father, brothers, sisters, and 14 nieces and nephews.

For him, Western media outlets are “partners” in Israel’s crimes.

“The Western media have a job. Their job is to report the news as it happens and they’re not doing their job,” he said.

“The international community also has the responsibility to stop Israel from committing these atrocities against the Palestinian people, but unfortunately, they’re not doing their job.”

He also called out Western media outlets for their apathy on the relentless killing of journalists in Gaza, where at least 142 media workers have been killed in Israeli attacks since last October.

Western media does not care about their Palestinian colleagues because of their “identity” and “skin color.”

“If this mass killing of journalists happened in another country, if they were not Palestinians, we would have seen uproar from all the Western media,” he said.

“Unfortunately, just because they’re Palestinians, the world did not care much about it. This is a tragedy. The Western media is racist.”

Israel will not succeed in silencing Palestinian journalists

Israel is facing a genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for its assault on Gaza, which has now killed over 34,600 Palestinians, the vast majority being women and children, and wounded nearly 77,900.

It has displaced millions more, around 85% of the population, leaving them facing famine and acute shortages of medical aid and other essentials.

Israeli attacks have also laid waste to large swaths of the besieged enclave, devastating everything from housing to medical facilities, educational institutes, and all sorts of civic infrastructure.

These are the crimes that Israel wants to somehow hide with its “assassinations” of journalists, but it will not succeed, said Alnaouq.

“When you kill a journalist in Palestine, another 100 people will want to become a journalist,” he said.

Palestinians and the people of Gaza have long relied on “citizen journalists who take it upon themselves to record what’s happening … and share it with the world,” he said.

Despite all of Israel’s atrocities, these people will continue doing that because they view it as a “moral, ethical and professional responsibility” that will do anything to fulfill, he added.

(Source: AA)

Azad Essa

It’s been called many names. The “student intifada”. The “American Spring”.

But while commentators search for a fitting description for the historic and unprecedented student protests that have captured the world’s imagination, a burgeoning movement for Palestine marches on.

Since Columbia students launched their encampment on 17 April, the student movement in support of Palestinians and in solidarity with the people of Gaza has mushroomed to more than 100 universities across 46 states.

The rapid expansion of student protests across the US against Israel’s war on Gaza – which has now killed nearly 35,000 Palestinians, including at least 13,000 children – have also triggered a parallel campaign to demonise and discredit the movement as violent, antisemitic and against peaceful co-existence.

Middle East Eye examines three of the most pervasive myths that have sought to discredit the pro-Palestine movements on campuses.

Myth 1: The protest movement has been violent

One of the staple myths since the Gaza solidarity encampments began is that they have been violent.

However, there is no evidence of pro-Palestine student protesters being engaged in violent protests of any kind.

MEE visited six university encampments in four states and found that students at each of the sites were focused on education through teach-ins, prayer and building community, and engaged in artistic forms of resistance.

Yes, students did take over buildings at Columbia and Princeton. It is also true that slogans have called for the Palestinian right to resist occupation. 

But there is no evidence to suggest that any student or faculty were threatened or harmed in the occupation of the halls.

The takeover of the respective halls comes in the footsteps of students from previous generations at both Columbia and Princeton who opposed the Vietnam War or the apartheid regime in South Africa – and have since been celebrated and even had those moments in time memorialised on campus.

After the first encampment at Columbia was dismantled and several protesters were arrested, the New York Police Department released a statement in which it noted that the protesters were peaceful and hadn’t resisted arrest.

When the police stormed Hamilton Hall – now popularly known as Hind’s Hall – on Tuesday evening, police admitted that there wasn’t substantial resistance.

MEE has spoken at length to Jewish students at Tufts, Brown, Harvard, Princeton, Occidental College, and Columbia University.

The Jewish students who spoke to MEE at these campuses said that claims of antisemitism were being used as a crutch to silence criticism of Israel and to discredit the student movement. 

“As a Jewish person, this issue is particularly important to me, as I have seen the ways in which Jewish grief has been weaponised and Jewish safety has been co-opted to excuse this murder,” Violet Barron, a student at Harvard University, told MEE previously in a video interview.

“Ideas of Jewish safety have also been co-opted here (at Harvard) and used to quash pro-Palestine speech and rhetoric and anti-semitism has been invoked falsely in order to silence those who speak out on Palestine,” Barron added.

MEE observed at Princeton and Columbia that it was pro-Israel students with Israeli flags who approached students supporting Palestine and taunted them in an attempt to provoke them.

At Northeastern University, a student called on students to chant “Kill the Jews”. It was revealed that the person who did so was a pro-Israel agitator. The students refused to chant after him and asked the agitator to leave. He faced no threats.

At an earlier encampment at Stanford University, one Jewish student told MEE that it was pro-Israeli students and faculty who often walked by and called students at the encampment “terrorist” or “Hamas”.

“One of the main reasons I am here supporting the encampment is because in my experience, antisemitism and anti-zionism are often conflated,” Tobias, a student at Occidental College, in Los Angeles, told MEE. 

“I think it very vital and powerful to have Jewish anti-Zionists to make this distinction clear because so often antisemitism is weaponised in a way that is extremely unhelpful, extremely harmful, and ultimately hurts the Jewish people,” Tobias, who offered just his first name, said.

In one documented case of violence at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, where 90 pro-Palestinian protesters were arrested, Annelise Orlick, a Jewish professor, was thrown to the ground – but by the police.

“Those cops were brutal to me,” Orleck, the former chair of Dartmouth College’s Jewish studies department, said.

“I promise I did absolutely nothing wrong. I was standing with a line of women faculty in their 60s to 80s trying to protect our students. I have now been banned from the campus where I have taught for 34 years.”

Orleck said the cops “tried to hurt me. They did hurt me. And they seemed to enjoy it”.

Myth 3: Students are uncompromising and divisive

Students have been calling for an end to what human rights activists and lawyers are calling a genocide in Gaza.

Other principal demands from students involve calling on their university to disclose financials and divest from companies involved in the occupation of Palestine and the current Israeli war on Gaza.

Universities across the US have also carried other demands including dropping charges against students and faculty, bringing Palestinians from Gaza on scholarship to universities, or creating Arab culture centres. 

The targeting of pro-Palestine faculty and students have only enlarged the movement and made it more diverse in thought and perspective.

The students have also tried to ensure that the conversation is not just about free speech or student repression on campuses, but on ending the occupation of Palestine.

“I do believe that the role of the student movement is to demand divestment and that liberation in Palestine will come from Palestinians. Our role is just to support that movement, not to centre ourselves in it,” one Jewish-American student at Tufts University told MEE.

(Source:MEE)

Turkiye’s trade halt with Israel will continue until a permanent ceasefire in Gaza is secured as well as unhindered humanitarian aid flow to the region, Trade Minister Omer Bolat said today according to Reuters.

Turkiye stopped all exports and imports to and from Israel yesterday, citing the “worsening humanitarian tragedy” in the Palestinian territories.

Israel’s uncompromising attitude and worsening situation in Gaza prompted Turkiye to halt trade, Bolat said in a speech in Istanbul while announcing April trade figures. The two countries had a trade volume of $6.8 billion in 2023.

Reacting to Turkiye’s announcement, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said Ankara is “breaking agreements by blocking ports for Israeli imports and exports. This is how a dictator behaves.”

“Israel will emerge with a strong and daring economy,” he added.

Turkiye’s decision comes a month after Ankara announced that it had restricted the export to Israel of products from 54 different categories, including iron, marble, steel, cement, aluminium, brick, fertiliser, construction equipment and products, aviation fuel and more.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which, in January, issued an interim ruling that ordered it to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.

(Source: MEMO)