Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Gulf News
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Jewish-American scholar who was to lecture in Palestinian university denied entry
Occupied Jerusalem (AFP) Renowned Jewish-American scholar and political activist Noam Chomsky said he was barred from entering Israel and the West Bank on Sunday to speak at a Palestinian university.
Chomsky had been invited to speak yesterday at Bir Zeit University near Ramallah, but was stopped from entering the West Bank at the Israeli-controlled border post from Jordan, he told Israel’s Channel 10 television.
“I went with my daughter and two old friends. We went in the normal way to the border where we were all interrogated. They were particularly interested in me,” he told Channel 10, speaking from Jordan.
Chomsky said the Israeli border officials were “very polite” as they “transmitted inquiries from the ministry of the interior”.
‘Misunderstanding’
However, he was denied entry because “the government did not like the kinds of things I say and they did not like that I was only talking at Bir Zeit and not at an Israeli university too”, he said.
“I asked them if they could find any government in the world that likes the things I say,” Chomsky said. A spokeswoman from Israel’s interior ministry, which controls the country’s borders, said Chomsky was still at the border and may yet be given permission to enter the West Bank. “We are checking it with security officials,” Sabin Hadad said.
She said the decision not to allow him in appeared to be “some kind of a misunderstanding,” and added Chomsky was “not on any [black] list”.
Palestinian lawmaker Mustafa Barghouti, who had invited Chomsky to speak at the university, said the scholar had been detained at the border for five hours. “This act shows the nature of the Israeli government that is against freedom of speech, particularly from such a noted international figure like Chomsky,” said Barghouti.
Chomsky, 81, is a professor of linguistics at the US Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a prominent critic of US foreign policy. He has also frequently spoken out against Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.
Editorial comment - Page 8
Manama Jewish linguist Noam Chomsky has blasted Israel after he was denied entry into the West Bank on Sunday, saying that it behaved like a “Stalinist” state.
Chomsky told an Israeli daily that he concluded from the questions of the Israeli official that the fact that he went to lecture at a Palestinian and not an Israeli university led to the decision to deny him entry.
“I find it hard to think of a similar case, in which entry to a person is denied because he is not lecturing in Tel Aviv. Perhaps only in Stalinist regimes,” Chomsky said, quoted by Haaretz.
Chomsky had been scheduled to lecture at Bir Zeit University near Ramallah, and visit Hebron, as well as meet Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and several Palestinian activists.
On Sunday, at about 1:30pm he reached the Israeli side of the border with Jordan. After three hours of questioning, during which the border officer repeatedly called the Interior Ministry for instructions, Chomsky’s passport was stamped with “Denied Entry.” Entry was also denied to his daughter.
Chomsky said that it was clear that his arrival had been known to the authorities, because the minute he entered the passport control room the official told him that he was honoured to see him and that he had read his works.
Task at hand
The professor concluded that the officer was a student, and said he looked embarrassed at the task at hand, especially when he began reading from text the questions that had been dictated to him, and which were also told to him later by telephone.
“The official asked me why I was lecturing only at Bir Zeit and not an Israeli university,” Chomsky recalled. “I told him that I have lectured a great deal in Israel. The official read the following statement: ‘Israel does not like what you say.’”
Chomsky replied: “Find one government in the world which does.”
“The young man asked me whether I had ever been denied entry into other countries. I told him that once, to Czechoslovakia, after the Soviet invasion in 1968,” he said, adding that he had gone to visit ousted Czechoslovak leader Alexander Dubcek, whose reforms the Soviets crushed.
In response to the official’s question, Chomsky said that the subjects of his lectures were “America and the world,” and “America at home.” The official asked him whether he would speak on Israel and Chomsky said that because he would talk of US policy, he would also comment on Israel and its policies. He was then told by the official: “You have spoken with [Hassan] Nasrallah.”
“True,” Chomsky told him. “When I was in Lebanon [prior to the war in 2006] I spoke with people from the entire political spectrum there, as in Israel I also spoke with people on the right.”
“At the time I read reports of my visit in the Israeli press, and the articles in the Israeli press had no connection with reality,” Chomsky told the border official.
The official asked Chomsky why he did not have an Israeli passport. “I replied I am an American citizen,” Chomsky said.
Chomsky said that he asked the man at border control for an official written explanation for the reason his entry was denied and that “it would help the interior ministry because this way my version will not be the only one given to the media.” The official called the ministry and then told Chomsky that he would be able to find the official statement at the US Embassy.
Editorial comment - Page 8
AFP
I find it hard to think of a similar case, in which entry to a person is denied because he is not lecturing in Tel Aviv. Perhaps only in Stalinist regimes.”
Noam Chomsky (left)
American scholar
By Habib Toumi?Bureau Chief
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