Jerusalem – The US political author and critic of Israel Norman Finkelstein was denied entry to the Jewish state on Friday, his lawyer said.
Finkelstein landed at Ben Gurion international airport near Tel Aviv in the early morning and was told by a representative of the ministry of interior that he would not be allowed into the country on ‘security’ grounds, attorney Michael Sfard told dpa.
‘This usually means a 10-year ban on entry,’ Sfard added.
Finkelstein, who is Jewish and the son of Holocaust survivors, has written critical books on Israeli policies in the Palestinian territories and on what he called ‘exploitation’ of the Jewish tragedy during World War II.
Finkelstein has received with the fierce disapproval of some authors and academics, while others have praised his controversial works.
American Jews largely vote Democratic. Barack’s fine.
Zimbabwe, oops, sorry, “the Middle East’s only democracy” is at it again. Funny, if Israel had actually wanted to vindicate what Finkelstein has been saying for years, they couldn’t have gone about it in a better way.
I wonder, should the ‘Law of Return” be amended to allow entry only to Jews who unquestioningly support Israel’s policies?
With a suitably loose definition of “security threat”, no change to the law is necessary! That’s the beauty of vaguely worded crappy laws.
I was also wondering about this Law of Return thing. My guess is that jailing him is kashrut, but expelling him is not unless they find him to be a ‘moser’ or some other form of treason. But since he did not commit the unforgivable crime of choosing to become a member of another religion I suspect that their case against him is really based on nothing. I wonder if that will set off some interesting discussions in the Isareli rabbinate or if Finkeslstein has already been condemned by them.
I would suspect that the vast majority of Israelis, as always, will blindly swallow the official line that Finkelstein was deported due to ‘security concerns’ and give the matter no more thought than they would to the five Palestinians killed by the IOF in Gaza over the past 2 days.
Maybe so for most Israelis, but not Orthodox Jews for whom anything affecting a fellow Jew has a cosmic dimension (I mean this literally) which far exceeds any political considerations. Deporting a Jew from Israel is, I would guess, something impossible so the only way to do that with Finkelstein would be to accuse him of having abdicated or betrayed his Jewishness (like a Jew converting to Christianity would).
I almost can visualize how the various Hassidim rabbis will argue and litigate about this.
National security means whatever the state wants it to mean. There are clearly no genuine security reasons for denying Finkelstein entry but there are certainly political reasons.
Indeed strange, and why don´t the Israeli´s let go of Vanunu, FOR SECURITY REASONS?
Anna