UPDATE Scroll down for what you can do to help.
Engage notes with great concern the existence of a ban on Palestinian students attending Israeli universities as revealed in a petition to Israel’s High Court brought by GISHA, the Center for the Legal Protection of Freedom of Movement.

We endorse and support the call from Heads of Palestinians Universities to members of Global Civil Society and Academia for appropriate action to protest against this restriction on entry and re-entry.

We condemn this ban in the strongest possible terms, and call upon academics and trade unionists to protest the ban directly to Higher Education Minister Yuli Tamir.

Engage stands for academic freedom in Israel and Palestine, and for international academic exchange as a good in itself and because it can form part of a path to peace. We oppose unambiguously all attempts to apply discrimination on the basis of nationality to ordinary academic interchange, whether this be in the form of a boycott of Israeli academic institutions and academics or in the form of a ban on Palestinians studying in Israel.

Jon Pike
(For Engage)

How can you help? (request from Gisha (Center for the legal protection of freedom of movement)

1. Write to Education Minister Yuli Tamir and ask her to intervene to cancel the ban. details for sending the letter to Yuli Tamir:

MK Professor Yuli Tamir
Minister of Education
Education Ministry
Jerusalem
Fax: 02-5602246, Email: ytamir@knesset.gov.il

2. Encourage your colleagues in Israel and abroad to make their voices heard, including by writing to the Education Minister.

3. Ask the professional associations to which you belong -- university-wide, regional, national, international, subject-specific -- to write to the Education Minister and even call or ask to meet with her, to ask for her intervention.

At a time when Israeli academics are justifiably opposing calls to prevent Israeli academics from studying and researching - just because they are Israeli - Gisha calls on Israel not to prevent Palestinian students from studying - just because they are Palestinian.

Please feel free to contact Gisha's offices at 972-3-6092183
for more information.

Best regards,

Sari Bashi, Director, Gisha
Eva Mousa, Advocacy Coordinator, Gisha