Visas

After a lovely vacation at home, I am now back in Bethlehem and with a new 3 month visa! My flights went fine, and security in the airport did too, thus allowing me to return to Bethlehem for another 3 months. As many of you may know, I am unable to get a volunteer or work visa for my work in Bethlehem. Why? Because I work in the West Bank, which is in the Palestinian territories, and a place the Israeli authorities do not want many internationals working, they will not give out visas to most West Bank organizations. The only way to receive a volunteer visa or work visa is if you work for a large and well-recognized organization, such as the United Nations or a church. Even when these visas are received, they often have limits. A volunteer visa can only be renewed for up to 2 years and a work visa can usually only be renewed for 5 years. This means, many international organizations and Palestinian organizations who rely on international workers suffer from a high rate of turnover. This increased for the organizations that cannot give their workers any type of visa, which means their workers must stay in the country with tourist visas.

When landing at ben Gurion airport, the standard tourist visa is 3 months. So for me, like many others, I must leave the country every three months in order to gain a new tourist visa upon my return. At anytime, however, the person in the passport line can refuse to give you a 3 month visa, either giving you a 1 month visa, a 2 week visa, or turning you around at the border and refusing your entry into Israel. It becomes increasingly difficult to obtain tourist visas the longer you have been in the country, and the more previous Israeli stamps you have. At no time can you let on that you work in the West Bank, or the likelihood that you will not receive a visa, increases to almost 100%.

You can then imagine how happy I was to receive another 3 month visa without any problems at the airport! Others, recently, have not been so lucky. My friend Faith Rowold and her boyfriend Jared Malsin were both denied entry into the State of Israel, which thus barred them from returning to their work lives in Bethlehem. I first met Faith last year in February, soon after I had arrived in Jerusalem for the first time. When I moved to Bethlehem, she connected me with her sister Katie, who was moving to Bethlehem and needed a roommate. Katie and I and are friend Sara now share a flat in Bethlehem.

Faith has been volunteering for the Luthern Church, working with the International Center of Bethlehem, a cultural and arts center, which provides many Palestinians in Bethlehem opportunities to learn. In the past few months, her volunteer visa expired, and since she had been here for 2 years, she could not renew it again. She decided to stay for another 6 months to try and wrap her work up before she left. In order to stay this extra time, she had to resort to 3 month tourist visas. Last week, when she tried to come into Israel with her boyfriend, after a vacation in Prague, she was denied re-entry for 3 months. She was not even given a week to pack up her things and say goodbye. After being in a detention cell in the airport for almost 2 days, she was deported to Prague. Her boyfriend, the editor for the English edition of Ma'an, one of the top Palestinian newspapers, was also denied entry. He has not yet been deported, but still awaits a hearing to see whether he will be able to come back and continue his journalism work.

Please read the following articles, as this story has been covered on BBC and the New York Times, as well as Ma'an News.
Ma'an Article
New York Times Article
BBC Article
Report from the Lutheran Church