Prof Ghassan Abu-Sitta, who is a well-known British Palestinian surgeon, has been denied entry to France to take part in a French senate meeting in relation to the Israel-Hamas war.
Abu-Sitta was supposed to speak in the senate on Saturday. However, upon arrival at Charles de Gaulle airport on a direct flight from London, he was not permitted by the French authorities to enter France, SchengenVisaInfo reports.
As Abu-Sitta explained on his X social media account, Germany had imposed a one-year entry ban on him, and for this reason, he was not allowed to enter the territory of France.
I am at Charles De Gaule airport. They are preventing me from entering France. I am supposed to speak at the French Senate today. They say the Germans put a one-year ban on my entry to Europe.
Commenting on the matter, the French authorities said that Abu-Sitta was denied entry to Germany in April, and the latter decided to ban him for a year.
Since Germany is a Schengen country, it means that Abu-Sitta was automatically banned from entering the other member states, too.
As the Guardian explains, it is unclear whether Abu-Sitta was aware of the entry ban imposed on him by Germany before flying to Paris.
However, the Elysée said that the authority itself was not aware of the ban, stressing that when such a measure applies to someone, “the border police can’t do much about it.”
Europe Is Silencing Witnesses to the Genocide, Abu-Sitta Said
The theme of the conference to which Abu-Sitta was invited to take place was “France and its responsibility in the application of international law in Gaza.”
In October and November of last year, Abu-Sitta volunteered in Gaza hospitals and claimed that he was witnessing a massacre unfold, providing evidence about Israel using white phosphorus munitions.
Following such claims made by him, he was denied to enter Germany to take part in a pro-Palestinian conference.
Now that Abu-Sitta has also been denied entry to France and won’t be able to enter any of the Schengen countries until the entry ban imposed by Germany is no longer effective, he said that Europe is trying to silence witnesses to the genocide.
Fortress Europe silencing the witnesses to the genocide while Israel kills them in prison.
The Europe Écologie-Les Verts senator who organised the conference, Raymonde Poncet Monge, was also not happy about the situation. She condemned the action of the police and contacted the interior minister’s office.
This is a new step in the repression of everything to do with Palestine.
Despite the ban, Abu-Sitta was still able to talk at the conference virtually following mobilisation of lawyers.
