• Israel grants humanitarian entry permit to US Democratic deputy Rashida Tlaib
  • Israel denies entry to US democratic deputies. Netanyahu: "They just wanted to hurt Israel"

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16 August 2019New coup in the troubled story of the visit planned in Israel by two members of the American congress. Rashida Tlaib, a member of the Democratic Party of Muslim descent, refused to go to Israel because of the "oppressive conditions" posed by the Jewish state.

Yesterday the Israeli government had decided to ban Tlaib and his colleague Ilhan Omar because they were accused of supporting the boycott of Israel, and today he gave Tlaib, who has his family in the West Bank, an authorization for humanitarian reasons.

Israel had allowed US Democratic deputy Rashida Tlaib to visit to visit her 90-year-old grandmother in the West Bank. Interior Minister Aryeh Deri announced the approval of the humanitarian request presented by Tlaib. The announcement came the day after the ban on entry to Tlaib and the other US Democratic deputy Ilhan Omar , who intended to make a four-day visit to the Palestinian territories.

The two democratic deputies, the first Muslim women to be elected to the US Congress, support the Bds movement, which promotes the international boycott of Israel.

The decision taken yesterday by Israeli authorities came shortly after an intervention by US President Donald Trump, who had asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to deny entry visas to the two deputies, with whom he had engaged in a bitter controversy in recent weeks.

After the entry ban, Tlaib applied for a humanitarian permit to visit her Palestinian relatives living in the West Bank, "especially my grandmother, who is 90 and lives in Beit Ur al-Fouqa", as we read in the request presented to the Interior Minister Deri.

Tlaib was born in Detroit to Palestinian parents who had emigrated to the United States. Beit Ur al-Fouqa is a town west of Ramallah. "This would be my last chance to see her," Tlaib wrote in her request, assuring her that "I will respect the restrictions and will not promote the boycott of Israel during my visit." Minister Deri, in announcing the granting of permission to the US MP, expressed the hope that Tlaib will keep its commitments.