Ramallah: International activists in Palestine will seek to sue Israel in international courts, arguing that the Israeli military is increasingly targeting them at the peaceful demonstrations organized throughout the West Bank to object to the Israeli segregation barrier and the spreading colonies.
“Such an action should have taken place a long time ago as international protestors who have been identified are badly humiliated, beaten, detained and interrogated, and are also now being deported from the Palestinian Territories,” said Jamal Juma’a, who heads the Palestinian Public Anti Wall and Anti Colonies Campaign in the Palestinian Territories.
“The supporters will lodge personal complaints and international human rights organisations will be pressured to play a more active role by supporting them legally.”
Juma’a said that the other side of the international supporters’ campaign will target the countries they come from to encourage them to provide activists with better protection and support.
“Those countries, mainly European states, should assist their citizens to get freedom of movement,” he said.
“It is a Palestinian right to host guests. This fact was clearly highlighted in the Oslo Accords and is evident in other agreements signed between the Israelis and Palestinians,” he said.
“Israel does not have the right disturb the flow of visitors to Palestine or to choose to block any visitors coming to the Palestinian Territories.”
Juma’a contends that international supporters arriving in Israel in order to enter the West Bank are interrogated by Israeli authorities, and that those supporters often provide Israeli investigators with fake stories in order to secure access to the West Bank.
“Once spotted or stopped by the Israeli military in the West Bank, international supporters are treated by the Israelis as if they were illegal immigrants,” he said.
“The Israeli military also targets international supporters more than they do Palestinians,” Juma’a said.
He argues that the aggression is causing the number of international supporters in the Palestinians Territories to decline.
“If Israel treated the international supporters fairly, their numbers in the West Bank would be in the thousands,” he stressed.
“Israel’s a new policy against international supporters means that, if detained in the West Bank, they will be blacklisted and deported from Israel.”
“The argument is that they were given visas to visit Israel, not the Palestinian Territories, and that therefore their presence in the West Bank is illegal and in violation of the visa terms,” he said.
Juma’a said that the Israeli military interprets the law in its own way since the visas granted to international supporters do not mention a ban placed on the Palestinian Territories.
“The existence of the international supporters is a key ingredient of the Palestinian struggle to win freedom and independence,” he said.
He says that the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) should also play a role in protecting the foreign protestors.
“The PNA has been officially requested to follow up the issue of this crackdown and to address the issue of the treatment of the protestors with the international community,” he said.
The issue of the treatment of international supporters becomes more important during the summer season, when many of them arrive in the Palestinian Territories.
