On 6 November 2019, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) along with Palestinian organizations Al-Haq, BADIL, and the Community Action Center at Al-Quds University sent a joint urgent appeal to the offices of five United Nations (UN) Special Procedures mandate holders to call for action to prevent the deportation of the Palestinian human rights defender Omar Barghouti. The Israeli Interior Minister, Arye Deri, announced on 6 October 2019 that he had initiated proceedings to revoke Barghouti’s residency status based on “breach of allegiance” to the State of Israel.
Barghouti, a human rights defender and co-founder of the nonviolent Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement (BDS), has been repeatedly targeted by the Israeli government for his calls for freedom, justice, and equality for the Palestinian people. In the joint urgent appeal, the organizations argued that the threatened revocation of Barghouti’s residency status as a result of his human rights work has grave implications for further repression, silencing, and intimidation of advocates for Palestinian rights by the Israeli government. The organizations urged the relevant special procedures mandate holders to recognize Israel’s policy and practice of residency revocation as illegal and to call on Israel to repeal its discriminatory Entry into Israel Law and the “breach of allegiance” criteria used to revoke Palestinian residency rights.
The urgent appeal was delivered to: the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, Mr. Michael Lynk; the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Mr. Michel Forst; the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Mr. David Kaye; the Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, Mr. Clément Nyaletsossi Voule; and the Independent Expert on human rights and international solidarity, Mr. Obiora C. Okafor.
Read full Appeal : here
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