The National Lawyers Guild International strongly denounces the denial of entry of NLG member and Samidoun Political Prisoner Network international coordinator Charlotte Kates, and the denial of entry of a co-founder of the Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement (Masar Badil) Khaled Barakat, to the Netherlands and their deportation from Amsterdam airport to Canada by the Dutch military police.
Charlotte Kates and Khaled Barakat were on their way to participate in the Week of Action for Return and Liberation of Palestine being organized by Masar Badil. As soon as they arrived in Amsterdam Schiphol airport on Monday morning, October 24, 2022, they were detained by the immigration service operated by the Dutch military police.
Both Barakat and Kates were interrogated about their political views, about their organizations, and about the week of action for liberation and return. This is a clear indication that these EU state forces are politically attacking not only Palestinian movement leaders like Charlotte and Khaled, but targeting their organizations and the Palestinian movement overall.
We see their denial of entry and deportation as escalation of a larger attack on Palestinian civil society and solidarity organizing carried out by the European Union.
In recent years, we have become concerned about the mounting political attacks and repression of Palestinians and Palestinian solidarity organizations in the EU states. Throughout the region, we have seen increasing censorship of the movement and in Germany, we have seen the raiding of Palestinian movement groups, increasing criminalization and outright bans on their right to rally in support of Palestinian rights. Yet, we have seen at the same time these same government forces protecting the rights of fascists groups to march, enabling the spread of their ideologies and support.
Furthermore, on the heels of the attack by the Dutch military police, the Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte is arriving in the settler colonial Zionist state for two days of talks, amid an escalation of of Zionist colonial violence, including the targeted assassinations of Palestinian resisters. The Netherlands and Germany both support the Zionist entity financially, militarily, and politically, even during their countless aggressions and wars against the Palestinian people and the Gaza strip.
The NLG calls on its members and affiliated organizations to take action to support against this attack:
Condemn EU complicity with Israel in attack on March of Return and the diaspora Call or write the EU: https://european-union.europa.eu/contact-eu_en and urge them to condemn the detention, interrogation and deportation of Khaled Barakat and Charlotte Kates, as well as end the attacks against our organizations and the Palestinian movement.
Express your Unequivocal Support for the March for Return and Liberation Endorse the Week of Action and the March for Return and Liberation! Join our endorsers (below) in the movement and add your voice, your name and your support to this important project.
The March for Return and Liberation will gather in Brussels this Saturday 29 October. The march will take to the streets of the capital of the European Union with a historic rally at the European Parliament. Demands of the march include: the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea, an end to the EU-Israel Association Agreement and the liberation of all Palestinian prisoners.
