A RECTOR of a Scottish university who was blocked from entering France and Germany to talk about Gaza has had a travel ban against him lifted.
Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah, a renowned plastic surgeon who is Glasgow University's rector, was "forcibly prevented" from entering Germany last month after being invited to host a conference in Berlin about his work as a surgeon in Gaza.
He was subsequently denied entry into France earlier this month where he was due to give testimony in front of the French Senate on Gaza's healthcare system and Israeli attacks against it.
The British-Palestinian doctor was informed by authorities that Germany had enforced a Schengen-wide ban on his entry into the EU.
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He spoke to Middle East Eye to recall his detention at the airport in Germany, and said the country was “accomplice to the genocidal war” and trying to “bury evidence”.
Abu-Sittah - a world-leading expert on war-injured patients and children - has now reported on Twitter/X, however, that this ban has been lifted.
He said on Tuesday evening: "The travel ban put on me for the Shengen area countries has been lifted."
SNP MP Dr Philippa Whitford (below), who worked at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital from the summer of 1991 to December 1992 with the charity Medical Aid for Palestinians, welcomed the news replying: "Good! Just submitted another Written Parliamentary Question to Foreign Office on it today!"
In October and November last year Abu-Sittah spent seven weeks operating from Gaza’s Al-Shifa and Al-Ahli Baptist Hospitals, giving him key insight into the conditions faced by doctors practising in Gaza.
Tayab Ali, the director of the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP), said refusal to allow Abu-Sittah entry into France amounted to a crackdown on free speech.
“ICJP are instructing lawyers in France and Germany to see that the German’s authoritarian crackdown on free speech and witness testimony won’t stand," he said at the time.
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