Palestinian woman fighting against barricade to learning

Chicago Tribune

(MCT)

ANATA, West Bank - With her tightly wrapped headscarf and retiring manner, Sawsan Salameh seems an unlikely person to challenge the Israeli security authorities.

But after she was refused entry to Israel to pursue a doctorate at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Salameh, 29, went to court in a case that has focused attention on a ban that bars new Palestinian students from Israeli universities.

Salameh was accepted this year with a full scholarship for doctoral studies in theoretical chemistry at the Hebrew University, whose science campus is a 20-minute drive from her home in the village of Anata. But since she lives in the West Bank, she cannot enter Israel without a permit, like most Palestinians.

Her repeated applications for entry were turned down as part of the ban on newly enrolled Palestinian students, which Israeli officials say has been imposed for security reasons.

"I was surprised and angry," Salameh said. "I thought my dream had ended and that there was nothing I could do."

A request directed to the authorities by Salameh's supervisor, Professor Raphael Levine of the Hebrew University, also failed to produce results. An acquaintance put her in touch with an Israeli human-rights group, Gisha, which advocates for easing army restrictions on Palestinians' freedom of movement.

Gisha joined Salameh in petitioning Israel's Supreme Court to overturn the entry ban, and the court recommended last month that the state negotiate with her lawyers to allow her entry on a limited basis to pursue her studies. But the state has yet to respond, and on Oct. 25 it asked for a two-week extension.

The lawyers from Gisha argued for a repeal of the sweeping ban on entry by new Palestinian students and a return to the previous practice of examining permit applications on an individual basis.

Gisha asserted that by denying Salameh entry, when there are no doctoral programs at Palestinian universities in the West Bank, Israel was violating its obligation under international law to allow normal civilian life in areas it occupies.

"Israel should not be preventing Palestinian students from studying just because they are Palestinians," said Sari Bashi, director of Gisha and one of the lawyers representing Salameh. "We believe it is in Israel's interest to allow these people access to education to get the tools they need to build a peaceful and prosperous society."

While the lack of doctoral programs in the West Bank has led some students to pursue such studies abroad, travel alone by women is not accepted in traditional Palestinian society, aggravating the problem for female students like Salameh.

Israeli state representatives argued to the court that responsibility for education in the West Bank lies with the Palestinian Authority, not Israel.

Lt. Adam Avidan, the spokesman for the Civil Administration, the Israeli military government in the West Bank, said that students were not being specifically targeted by the ban but that they were part of an age group that has been designated as a potential security risk. Profiling of possible attackers has led to a general ban on entry by unmarried Palestinians aged 16 to 35. "The decision was taken because of the deterioration of the security situation in recent years," Avidan said, referring to Palestinian suicide bombings and other deadly attacks during the uprising that broke out in 2000. Some of the suicide bombers have been women.

But the state has not claimed in court that Salameh is a security risk, and one of the justices, Elyakim Rubinstein, suggested that since the potential number of Palestinian doctoral candidates seeking to study in Israel was limited, exceptions could be made. The judge expressed concern that the sweeping ban could hurt chances for Israeli-Palestinian cooperation.

Bashi said that three other Palestinian students seeking to study in Israel had approached Gisha and that the ban was already having a chilling effect on both potential applicants and academic institutions.

Currently there are 14 Palestinians studying in Israeli universities and they will continue to receive entry permits, Avidan said. Before the outbreak of the uprising, hundreds of Palestinian students studied in Israel.

Levine, Salameh's supervisor, said that the new ban was targeting precisely the Palestinians that Israel should be seeking contact with.

"I would call it counterproductive," he said in a telephone interview from Los Angeles, where he is teaching at the University of California. "We should be doing the opposite, looking for whoever we can to build a bridge to. It's also not in the spirit of what a university is, or the tradition of the Jewish people, that puts such a high value on learning."

Top officials of six Israeli universities have written to Defense Minister Amir Peretz, asking him to cancel the student entry ban and to examine each case individually. Similar appeals have been made by the ministers of education and science.

Salameh is a science teacher at a girls' high school and an elected member of the local council in Anata, where she is establishing a center to provide study help for schoolgirls and vocational training for women. She says her hope is that after earning a doctorate she could teach at a Palestinian or even Israeli university, a significant step at a time when there are few female professors at Palestinian academic institutions.

Allowing Palestinian students to study in Israel could help counter the negative effects of the ongoing conflict between the two sides, Salameh said.

"Academic communication could increase understanding and help the political situation," she said. "We only see Israeli soldiers, not ordinary people and academics, and this would be good for both of us, Palestinians and Israelis. It would be a chance to see the Israelis' brighter side."

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(c) 2006, Chicago Tribune. Distributed by Mclatchy-Tribune News Service.