The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Gandhi Peace Award recipient arrested
Barghouti accused of tax evasion in Israel
NEW HAVEN >> Omar Barghouti, a founder of the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions Movement against the Israeli government, will receive the annual Gandhi Peace Award on April 23 from the group Promoting Enduring Peace.
Chances are growing, however, that Barghouti, a noncitizen permanent resident of Israel, won’t be able to come to New Haven to receive the award and its $2,500 prize.
Barghouti, whose Israeli residency has been challenged in the past, was arrested Monday “on suspicion of tax evasion,” according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. His travel documents were taken from him, according to Stanley Heller, administrator of Promoting Enduring Peace.
Barghouti has been accused of not reporting $700,000 in income from his Ramallah, West Bank, company, National Computing Resources, and from speaking fees, Haaretz reported, citing the Globes business newspaper.
“I think it’s a general thing. They’re trying to smash the BDS movement in a lot of ways,” Heller said. “The president of Israel said BDS is a strategic threat.”
The Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., did not respond to a request for comment on Barghouti’s case.
BDS is an international movement that is trying to pressure Israel to end what activists call the country’s oppression of Palestinians and to force it to comply with international law.
“This is a guy who’s under a microscope,” Heller said. “Last year they were talking about taking away his permanent residency status. They want any excuse to throw him out.
“Basically he’s not under arrest except they come up in the morning and interrogate him all day. … Certainly we have large suspicions that this is a political persecution of Omar Barghouti.”
The Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee issued a statement saying that in March 2016, “several Israeli government ministers threatened Omar and key BDS human rights defenders with severe measures, including ‘targeted civil elimination’ — a euphemism for civil assassination. The Ministry of Strategic Affairs last year established a ‘tarnishing unit’ … to tarnish the reputation of BDS human rights defenders and networks. It is in this context that the Israeli tax department’s investigation of Omar and his wife, Safa, must be understood.”
Barghouti is a Qatariborn Palestinian. His wife is an Arab citizen of Israel. They live in Acre, Israel.
Heller called BDS “a completely nonviolent series of measures that put pressure on the Israeli government to cease its human rights violations and to allow Palestinian refugees to return home.”
The Gandhi Peace Award has been given since 1960. Recipients include Eleanor Roosevelt, labor leader Cesar Chavez and Dr. Benjamin Spock. A second honoree this year is Ralph Nader, a Winsted native and consumer advocate.
The event will be held at 4 p.m. April 23 at Sheffield-Sterling-Strathcona Hall, 1 Prospect St., Room 114, New Haven. It is free and open to the public.