Israel, Please Wake Up!

What has Happened to the Palestinian Students in Gaza Awarded Fulbright Scholarships.

By Citizen Paul

There comes a point where we Americans have got to say Enough!, even if to countries we are closely allied with.

And when we say Enough! we have to do be willing to act both thoughtfully and firmly!

One morning while having breakfast at the historic American Colony Hotel in Jerusalem on my trip to the Middle East we heard that Israel was refusing to let seven young Palestinian Students who had been awarded prestigious Fulbright Scholarships leave Gaza and come to the U.S.

They were “security risks” according to the Israelis — once again using that oh-so-convenient catch-all phase!

Immediately this made no sense!  These were top students who had been extensively “vetted” so to speak and whom our own government had awarded these scholarships and was inviting to America, the land of the free and home of the brave all expenses paid!  

The Israelis were essentially keeping these top accomplished young people imprisoned in Gaza and not even allowing them out to go to Jerusalem at the invitation of the American consulate there!

Talk about collective punishment and stupidity!

I felt an immediate sense of bewilderment and outrage!

Some days later, having left Israel and Palestine and made brief visits to Jordan, Syria and then Lebanon, we learned while traveling back to the U.S. that sanity had prevailed this time.  Apparently it was then reported, the Israelis had been embarrassed and pressured, including by public statements from Secretary of State Rice personally, and at least this time they had relented.

Even so because of what had happened by this time I had learned that there are literally thousands of Palestinian students in Gaza who are either enrolled in or accepted by universities in many countries, and in Jerusalem and the West Bank, and nearly all of them are blocked by the Israelis from going to their schools.

They are in fact imprisoned by Israel in Gaza behind the fences and barriers and tanks of the Israeli army.   But their plight is far less known and no one it seems is doing anything to tell the Israelis ENOUGH!

Now, about a month since the plight of the Gaza Fulbright students first became known, here’s the latest:

Sanity has not yet prevailed after all.

Even after all the international protests and the personal intervention of Secretary of Rice the Israelis still refuse to let 3 of the 7 Palestinians leave to accept their Fulbright scholarship at American Universities.   Even they remain essentially imprisoned in Gaza!

The Israelis have kept refusing in fact to even let the 3 award-winners go to the American Consulate in Jerusalem.

So finally, after all these weeks, the American Consulate came to them.

Apparently under orders from Washington since no one can remember this ever having happened before, U.S. officials this week went to the “Erez Crossing” — one of the Israeli military checkpoints that control all entry and exit from Gaza.  There they met the 3 trapped Fulbright students for the mandatory personal interview needed before they can get their U.S. visas.

But the Israelis still refuse to let them leave!

Fidaa Abed, 23,  is expected at the University of California at San Diego for a graduate degree in computer science. 

Zuhair Abu Shaaban, 24, plans to study electrical engineering at the University of Connecticut.  

And Osama Daoud, 25, has his Fulbright to pursue a doctorate in civil engineering at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.

So the U.S. Government is now thought to be in some kind of negotiations with the Egyptian government which controls the “Rafah Crossing” at the south end of Gaza to have these students leave Gaza and fly from Egypt to the U.S. 

Or it’s possible if even more pressure is exerted on Israel that the Israelis will allow U.S. officials to personally escort these three students out of Gaza, across Israel, to Jordan where they can fly to the U.S.

Whatever the outcome here this never should have happened.  Imagine we, the United States that supplies Israel with everything and which alone vetos one U.N. resolution after other trying to get them to live up to international law and basic human rights, have to “negotiate” with the Israelis on something like this!

And tragically it is just one example that has made the international news of the kinds of things the Israelis are doing to Palestinians all the time every day in so many different ways.

What about the many thousands of Gaza students who are supposed to be at Bir Zeit University in Ramallah, or at Bethlehem University, or at Al-Quds University in Jerusalem — all of which I visited on my trip — or at many universities in the Middle East, in Europe, and in the U.S. where they have been accepted and in many cases have already begun their studies?

I titled this “Israel, Please Wake Up!”

Maybe I should have addressed this to our own government officials and to Congress Men and Women in Washington:  “America, Please Wake Up!”

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