At the direction of Interior Minister Moshe Arbel, Israel denied entry to European Parliament member Rima Hassan upon her arrival from Brussels on Monday.
The decision followed a recommendation from the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism.
“The State of Israel is not obligated to allow the entry of any official from a foreign country, including members of parliament, if they work to boycott and undermine its legitimacy,” Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli said.
“Rima Hassan leads hostile campaigns against Israel, calls for boycotts and encourages economic sanctions,” he added. “We will use all the tools at our disposal to prevent the exploitation of our democracy for anti-Israeli purposes.”
Hassan has actively promoted boycotts against Israel and made numerous public statements criticizing the country on social media and in media interviews. She was slated to be sent back to Brussels immediately after landing, the Interior Ministry said.
A 32-year-old French jurist and politician of Palestinian origin from the far-left La France Insoumise (“France Unbowed”) party, Hassan recently blamed Israel for the Bibas family’s deaths, repeating a Hamas claim made shortly after their capture. “Kfir, Ariel and Shiri Bibas were killed by an Israeli strike. This had also been communicated and confirmed in November 2023. Thank you for being accurate,” wrote Hassan, who has defended Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre.
Forensic analyses performed in Israel found that mother Shiri Bibas and her sons Kfir and Ariel were not killed by an Israeli airstrike but murdered in cold blood by Hamas terrorists with their “bare hands” weeks after being captured.
On Sunday, Hassan tried to justify Palestinian terrorism against Israelis, tweeting: “Resolution 3070 (XXVIII) of the United Nations General Assembly: Reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples to free themselves from colonial and foreign domination and control by all means in their power, including armed struggle.”