British-Palestinian surgeon Abu-Sittah denied entry to the Netherlands

British-Palestinian surgeon Ghassan Abu-Sittah, who worked as a volunteer in Gaza for Doctors Without Borders and shared his eyewitness accounts with numerous international media and investigators into possible war crimes, has not been given permission by the Netherlands to travel into the country. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed this to the ANP news agency.

Abu-Sittah would come to the Netherlands between May 15 and 17 at the invitation of the Palestinian Mission in The Hague. His program included a visit to the House of Representatives, various lectures and a meeting with the head of the OPCW (Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons).

“I would discuss Israel’s use of white phosphorus with the OPCW,” Abu-Sittah told reporters by telephone. NRC. “I am an eyewitness to war crimes and The Hague is the capital of international law. As far as I’m concerned, that explains this entry ban. It is a way to silence the witnesses of genocide.”

‘Administrative ban’ for Schengen area
The Netherlands follows Germany’s line with this decision. That country stopped Abu-Sittah last month at Berlin airport, where the surgeon was due to speak at the Palestine Congress, a meeting that was banned and broken up by German police. At the time, Abu-Sittah said he was told that the entry ban would only apply to Germany.

It was only when he traveled to Paris last Saturday at the invitation of the French Senate that the doctor was told at the airport that Germany had imposed an ‘administrative ban’ preventing him from obtaining a visa for the entire Schengen area for a year. As a result, he was unable to enter France. “After that news, the Palestinian Mission in The Hague contacted the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs to ask what would happen in the Netherlands,” says Abu-Sittah. “Today [op donderdag] we heard that they will make no exception for me and will maintain the German ban.”

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs was not available for questions on Thursday, Ascension Day. The reason for the German ban has still not been announced by the German authorities, confirms Abu-Sittah’s lawyer Alexander Górski.

Parliamentary questions
The Rights Forum, a knowledge center in the field of Palestine and Israel that had organized a lecture with Abu-Sittah in Pakhuis De Zwijger in Amsterdam, calls the decision not to allow the surgeon into the Netherlands in a https://twitter.com/TheRightsForum/status/1788557547034575351 “shocking and completely unacceptable.” “As a host country [van het Internationaal Strafhof] The Netherlands has a special obligation not to obstruct the administration of justice […] Apparently our government views his testimony as a threat to the close ties with Israel and Dutch complicity in the massacre in Gaza.”

Member of Parliament Kati Piri (GroenLinks-PvdA), who organized the meeting with Abu-Sittah in the House of Representatives, also calls the decision to maintain the German ban “unprecedented”. “The Netherlands is not obliged at all to go along with the German decision. It is crazy that someone who cooperates in international investigations carried out from The Hague will no longer be able to make a statement here due to a German ban,” says Piri, who has announced that he will submit parliamentary questions to request clarification about the Dutch decision.

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British-Palestinian surgeon Abu-Sittah denied entry to the Netherlands

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