05.27.2008 | Haaretz
By Haaretz Editorial
On Friday morning, the State of Israel refused to allow Prof. Norman Finkelstein, an American Jewish political scientist, to enter the country. Finkelstein was arrested at the airport and questioned by the Shin Bet security service for several hours. A day later, it became known that he had been banned from entering Israel for 10 years, for security reasons. Finkelstein managed to meet with a lawyer, who told him his chances of changing the decision were slim. When the Shin Bet decides that someone constitutes a security risk, the courts do not intervene.
Finkelstein and me
[ 26/05/2008 – 04:59 PM ]
By Khalid Amayreh in the West Bank
Fettering journalists
Needless to say, Israel, which classifies Palestinians into either terrorists who ought to be annihilated or quisling-like collaborators, has no right to deny Palestinian journalists freedom of movement, internally or externally. Indeed, without this freedom, a journalist can hardly carry out his job properly.
As Palestinian journalists, we can’t be expected to compromise our honesty and professionalism for the sake of getting a travel permit from an occupying power that calls itself the freest and most democratic state in the Middle East.
We cannot adopt the Israeli narratives, use the Israeli jargon and parrot the Israeli lies. Our responsibility is first and foremost is to our conscience.
Israel and her supporters in North America and Europe claim ad nauseam that it is a democratic state.
But truly democratic states don’t impose town-arrests on journalists because their writings are deemed non-conformist.