NUJ campaigners meet Israeli ambassador

NUJ general secretary Jeremy Dear led a delegation to the Israeli embassy, demanding that Ewa Jasciewicz be allowed to return to her work filing reports on the West Bank.

Ms Jasciewicz is a freelance contributor to left-wing journal Red Pepper. She was detained in Tel Aviv airport on August 11 and refused entry to the country on the grounds that her reporting could be influenced by "violent" groups.

She appealed successfully against the authorities attempt to deport her but the decision was overturned last week and she now faces expulsion from the country without good reason.

By the time that the Israeli Supreme Court delivers its verdict this week, Ms Jasciewicz will have been imprisoned for more than three weeks.

She has been banned from talking to the media about her experiences while in the country.

NUJ National Organiser for Freelances John Toner said: "The Israeli courts have accepted that she poses no security threat, yet a judge has ruled that her political views make such a threat 'within the realm of reason'.

"It does look as if she is being denied entry because they don't like her political views," he noted.

Ms Jasciewicz's employer, Red Pepper editor Hilary Wainwright, said it was "now clear that the only threat Ewa poses is to Israel's moral legitimacy.

"For evidence of this, look no further than the Israeli government's decision to prevent Ewa from talking to the media. This is not about security, it is an attempt to control the way Israel is seen by the world, an attempt that has backfired," she stressed.