This report in Haaretz details a highly disturbing account of how Israel’s Shin Bet security service interrogated American citizens with Arab backgrounds for hours and demanded access to their personal email accounts at Ben Gurion Airport. After spending a night in custody, they were denied entry into Israel in May. If these accounts are true, why has there been no formal and public objection from the Obama Administration?
Najwa Doughman, a 25-year-old architect from New York, was visiting Israel for the third time. She was traveling with a friend, Sasha Al-Sarabi, 24. Both women have Palestinian roots and were taken into custody for extensive searches and prolonged interrogation. They recount how security officials demanded to know why Najwa would return to Israel, whether she felt “more Arab or more American?” and whether she wanted to visit Al-Aqsa.
The security officials demanded her access code and proceeded to read out load her email conversations about Israel and other subjects.
The account details highly abusive treatment of Americans by a country that still receives billions in aid from the United States. That money comes from all of our citizens, including those with Arab backgrounds. If this account is true, there should be a public demand for answers from the State Department, but there has been total silence from the Obama Administration. The silence is as disturbing as the allegation, in my view.
The Israeli government has reported told the newspaper that everything was done in a perfectly lawful manner under Israeli law.
Source: Haaretz
leejcarrol
The comment by Jacob also reveals he condemns anyone who supports a boycott of goods from settlements in the occupied territories as anti-semites. That position betrays his own agenda. Jacob condemns the “double standard” that Israel suffers. Have you seen any of the treatment that Palestinian farmers are subjected to by the settlers?
That’s nice, Jill, except Israel is not the United States and has different and narrower free-speech parameters, including a law that bans support for boycotts and divestment. While that would never pass constitutional muster in the U.S., it is the state of the law in Israel, to the best of my knowledge. You can make the case that these laws are ill-advised, and I would agree in this instance, but it’s just plain false to suggest that Israeli security agents broke the law in this instance. More broadly, as some of the commentators rightly note, Israel is a small country in a particularly hostile part of the world and it is understandable if not always admirable that it feels the need to constrain free speech in ways that a superpower like the United States does not.
BTW, if you are NOT paranoid, then you are either stupid, or catatonic. Who the EFF wants your best in this system? Nobody.
Whoever is right there are some facts, which I believe.
The arab/american lady did not travel there with expectations of passing freely by immigration control.
She in all likelihood had this planned as a combined photo/media op. And the Israelis were glad for the Israeli headlines.
Arab states need the Jewish state to have as an eternal enemy.
And the same can be said that the Jewish state has also both foreign and dommestic needs of this threat.
On both sides the people suffer. Is there a regretful politician. Not a damn one.
They are as stupid as the American citizens who pay billions for this charade. And all root for their team. What BS.
Wow, these Israeli officials are acting like people trapped in the middle of a hostile area, undergoing unusual conduct and so forth. How paranoid!!
(Recently I was called “paranoid” about how my government treated ME.)
Jill so if someone tried to enter the US who is active in group(s) that support the Taliban and Al queda we should give them a free pass because their name is Arabib sounding and it might look like we were racial profiling. The initial post states “If these accounts are true”, the information posted by Jacob indicates that the women have tied to groups whose goals are the overthrowing of Israel. But hey, it is their names that caused the trouble, if the accounts of the holding of them is true.
This starts to sound more and more like the Zimmerman posting thread where much is based on speculation and news reports that may or not be true.
The TSA infection is spreading.
So true Jacob. Maybe now Obama can send a drone her way! We can’t have people criticizing Israel, can we? Allowing them to exercise their rights to free speech and association? The only response to people exercising their rights is repression, otherwise they are going to get the idea that laws have meaning, and believe the state must act within the law. OMG!
Give me a break. The premise that these woman were detained simply because they were Arab is arrant nonsense. If you read the Haaretz story, which conspicuously downplays the point, you will see that one of the women, Sandra Tamari, is actually an anti-Israel activist. A cursory online search reveals that she is active in the St. Louis Palestine Solidarity Committee, which supports the anti-Israel movement’s sinister trinity of boycotts, divestment and sanctions against Israel – a blatantly anti-Semitic campaign intended to undercut Israel’s legitimacy in the international arena. Tamari also routinely travels to the Palestinian territories to agitate against Israel. Not surprisingly, her account of her travails at the hands of Israeli security appeared on the blog Mondoweiss, which is vociferously anti-Zionist, that is, opposed to the very idea of existence of Israel as a Jewish state. (The existence of hundreds of self-declared Muslim Arab and Muslim states is, of course, just fine. No double standard there!) So far from a random tourist harassed for her “Arabic-sounding” last name, then, this woman is well-known to Israeli authorities for her anti-Israel activism. And given the record of such activists in collaborating with the more extreme Palestinian elements, it’s neither surprising nor outrageous that Israeli security felt it appropriate to single her out for comprehensive interrogation of her intentions. It’s a sign of unusual reasonableness on the part of the Obama administration that they have chosen not to make an issue of this.
An English tourist reaches immigration at Kennedy, is questioned and examined tooth and nail.
He finally exclaims on being told to continue: “Thank God that you can’t read minds. I might have something
hidden there too.”
To which he is reöplied with: ” We are working on it.”
mr. ed,
That’s a great idea. Now tell me how you would handle being detained at the airport simply because you were an Arab American? Would you be wondering what might happen to you given both the US and Israel’s policy on renditions? What if they asked you for all your e-mails before you could be released?
You know, being separated from your family and put in zip cuffs is a really scary experience. Would you worry about what had happened to the rest of your family while you were in your interrogation room while they were (you don’t really know)? All of these things have happened to Arab Americans.
There may be more to this than meets the eye. Let’s not be so quick to judge when we don’t have all the facts.
Email? What’s that? I don’t have no steenking email!
And if I did, I’d have more than one account (I do), one a throwaway.
Yes! Also, why has there been no formal and public objection from the Obama Administration regarding this:
https://www.eff.org/wp/defending-privacy-us-border-guide-travelers-carrying-digital-devices
The administration raised no objections when an American citizen was killed protesting on behalf of justice for the Palestinians. At our airports and other border crossings Arab Americans are routinely subjected to interrogations. In other instances of “This Week in Lawlessness” Jacob Appelbaum, a supporter of one very brave, gay man, Bradley Manning, has been taken to interrogation rooms. In these rooms he is asked to talk about his feelings regarding president Obama. There has been a representative of the military present during his interrogations.
According to James Bamford, Israel’s secret agencies regularly monitor the communication of all American citizens. Israel and the US army regularly coordinate on war. The Israeli army has given US “law” enforcement extensive training on how to brutalize and terrorize OWS protesters. That’s just a short list!
I’m guessing these are just a few of the reasons why the administration doesn’t have any plans to object!
Nate, you seem to have missed the point. Dept of State protesting treatment of Americans — protecting Americans overseas engaged in lawful travel — is what they’re supposed to do. Your politically motivated reaction is a diversion, though politics, surely, is involved.
Another reason not to visit Israel.
As for the State Dept., don’t hold your breath for DOS sticking up for Arab-Americans; especially in an election cycle.
Why should the White House get involved? The government has thousands of priorities more important than commenting on Israel’s immigration policies with respect to one incident, especially given the sometimes tense nature of the diplomatic relationship these days. The “blame Obama” whining for everything in the world that isn’t fixed yet is getting a little old.
I love it when corrupt systems say things like “OH BUT IT WAS DONE IN COMPLETE COMPLIANCE WITH THE LAW.”
At least they are more up front with their system of intentional depriving of human rights…… Our government just scans your encrypted email without your knowledge or consent……the HSA has broad powers…..