Tel Aviv court orders expulsion of American ISM activist

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/449003.html

Tel Aviv District Court Judge Oded Modrik on Thursday ruled to expel New
Yorker Anne Robinson-Petter, the 44-year-old graphic and video artist who
has been under arrest by the Immigration Police for the past two weeks.
The expulsion request was made Israel's security services, on the grounds
that the member of the International Solidarity Movement posed a security
threat.
The Tel Aviv court upheld the decision denying her entry into Israel and
ordered her to leave the country within 24 hours, said her lawyer, Yael
Berda.
Robinson-Petter has been held at Ben-Gurion International Airport in the
holding cells reserved for people refused entry to the country.
She arrived two weeks ago for a 14-day visit with the intention of filming a
video about a 79-year-old Holocaust survivor traveling the country and the
territories, and to take part in demonstrations against the separation
fence.
According to Shamai Leibowitz, Robinson-Petter's second lawyer, Petter was
questioned for some 10 hours by security agents at the airport and refused
to hand over information about other members of the Israeli-Palestinian
organization.
She was denied entry to Israel on two grounds, says the report on her being
questioned at the airport: "Her guaranteed participation in hostile sabotage
activity," and belonging to "a leftist organization."
Another ISM activist, Rachel Corrie, 23, of Olympia, Washington, was crushed
to death by an Israeli army bulldozer in a Gaza refugee camp while trying to
stop soldiers from demolishing a house in March, 2003. The death was ruled
accidental.
Petter, who does work for the Museum of Modern Art in New York and Simon &
Schuster, the publishing house, refused to comply with the authorities'
refusal to allow her into the country, arguing that she had spent two weeks
in Israel two years ago without any conditions. When she refused to leave,
she was placed under arrest.
After her lawyers appealed to the District Court on the day after her
arrival, a temporary injunction was issued preventing the authorities from
deporting her. But the court refused to issue a release order letting her
out of the holding cells even under constraints.
The security services claimed at the closed door hearings two weeks ago that
they have "secret information" about the woman. At a court hearing Tuesday,
say her lawyers, the prosecutors refused to provide a statement backing up
the claims of the security services, which had originally argued at her
arrest that her presence in the country endangers state security.
"The prosecutors wanted the judge to hold a closed door hearing with the
Shin Bet representative, without a defense attorney present," said
Leibowitz.
"That would be a clear violation of the legal process, since if the state is
accusing my client of such grave charges its duty is to present a written
statement so we can respond to it."
While Robertson-Peter is not being allowed contact with anyone other than
her lawyer, she answered through him why she insisted on staying in Israel
despite the considerable discomfort it has involved for her.
"My client," said Leibowitz, "refuses to allow the state to impugn her with
the stigma of being a terrorist who is involved in hostile terrorist
activity, and she is disgusted by the way her activities on behalf of human
rights are regarded as a so-called danger to the security of the state. She
is fighting to prove that there is nothing wrong with her activities."