{"page":"\u003clink rel=\"stylesheet\" href=\"https://lessonplanet.com/assets/packs/css/resources-572d6a42.css\" /\u003e\n\u003clink rel=\"stylesheet\" href=\"https://lessonplanet.com/assets/packs/css/lp_boclips_stylesheets-f4d0de30.css\" media=\"all\" /\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-title='Foreigners left in limbo in the West Bank' data-url='/boclips/videos/5c54d6f9d8eafeecae207fb6' data-video-url='/boclips/videos/5c54d6f9d8eafeecae207fb6' id='bo_player_modal'\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='boclips-resource-page modal-dialog panel-container'\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='react-notifications-root'\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-header'\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-type'\u003e\n\u003ci aria-hidden='true' class='fai fa-regular fa-circle-play'\u003e\u003c/i\u003e\nVideo\n\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003ch1 class='rp-title' id='video-title'\u003e\nForeigners left in limbo in the West Bank\n\u003c/h1\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-actions'\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='mr-1'\u003e\n\u003ca class=\"btn btn-success\" data-posthog-event=\"Signup: LP Signup Activity\" data-posthog-location=\"body_link_boclips\" data-remote=\"true\" href=\"/subscription/new\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\u003cspan\u003eGet Free Access\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"\"\u003e for 10 Days\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e!\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\n\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-body'\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-info'\u003e\n\u003cdiv aria-label='Hide resource details' class='rp-hide-info' role='button' tabindex='0'\u003e\u0026times;\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003ci aria-label='Expand resource details' class='rp-expand-info fai fa-solid fa-up-right-and-down-left-from-center' role='button' tabindex='0'\u003e\u003c/i\u003e\n\u003ci aria-label='Compress resource details' class='rp-compress-info fai fa-solid fa-down-left-and-up-right-to-center' role='button' tabindex='0'\u003e\u003c/i\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-rating'\u003e\n\u003cspan class='resource-pool'\u003e\n\u003cspan class='pool-label'\u003ePublisher:\u003c/span\u003e\n\u003cspan class='pool-name'\u003e\n\u003cspan class='text'\u003e\u003ca data-publisher-id=\"30356011\" href=\"/search?publisher_ids%5B%5D=30356011\"\u003eCurated Video\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\n\u003c/span\u003e\n\u003c/span\u003e\n\u003c/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv class='rp-description'\u003e\n\u003cspan class='short-description'\u003eLEADIN:              Activists say Israel is making it harder for foreigners with ties to Palestinians to stay in the West Bank legally, rejecting more visa requests or issuing them for shorter periods.              STORYLINE:           ...\u003c/span\u003e\n\u003cspan class='full-description hide'\u003eLEADIN:\u003cbr/\u003e              Activists say Israel is making it harder for foreigners with ties to Palestinians to stay in the West Bank legally, rejecting more visa requests or issuing them for shorter periods.\u003cbr/\u003e              STORYLINE:\u003cbr/\u003e              Here at the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music, there are many foreign nationals on the teaching staff. \u003cbr/\u003e              This may not be the case for long, as Israel appears to be making it harder for foreigners with ties to Palestinians to stay in the West Bank legally.\u003cbr/\u003e              This will have an immense knock-on effect for families, universities and certainly this particular school teaching Western classical music to children.\u003cbr/\u003e              \"They (Israel) deny work visas. They deny West Bank authority visas. They don't want people to be here. I mean why don't you want people to come and teach classical Western music?\" asks the conservatory's director, Suhail Khoury.\u003cbr/\u003e              The school, with a total teaching staff of 77, offers Western and Arabic classical music courses to about 2,000 Palestinian students, most of them children, and the foreign teachers are often irreplaceable, says Khoury. \u003cbr/\u003e              According to Palestinian officials and Israeli lawyers, tougher visa rules - undeclared but noticeable since 2016 - have affected hundreds of foreigners, including Americans, who are married to Palestinians or work in the West Bank. \u003cbr/\u003e              Israel's aim, they allege, is to weaken Palestinian society and encourage mixed couples to emigrate.\u003cbr/\u003e              Palestinian-American businessman Sam Bahour is a veteran activist in the \"Right to Enter\" campaign.\u003cbr/\u003e              \"We are affected by this in a very serious way and it seems as if the Israeli goal is to get Palestinians to leave Palestine and take their foreign national spouses with them,\" he says.\u003cbr/\u003e              The underlying problem for foreigners is that the Palestinian self-rule government, which administers 38 percent of the West Bank, does not have the authority to grant them residency without approval by Israel.\u003cbr/\u003e              As a result, thousands of people are in limbo, with residency applications often ignored or rejected, leaving them only with the option of seeking temporary visas from Israel.\u003cbr/\u003e              COGAT, a branch of the Israeli Defence Ministry, denied it has adopted tougher rules, saying visa applications are judged on a case-by-case basis. It did not respond to requests to provide statistics.\u003cbr/\u003e              Meanwhile, Iowa-born Kate Hamad hasn't dared to leave the autonomous Palestinian town of Ramallah since her visa renewal request was rejected in October.\u003cbr/\u003e              \"When my visa renewal was denied, obviously it was very upsetting. I didn't come to Palestine with any ideas that this would be a problem, obviously. So, I was really shocked and I didn't know what to do. My husband and I talked and we, you know, we decided that the best thing to do was to appeal the decision and we're still waiting on the appeal,\" she says. \u003cbr/\u003e              Israel rejected her request for a visa even though her Palestinian husband and their three youngest children have West Bank residency. \u003cbr/\u003e              \"Basically I can't leave Ramallah. Anywhere where there is a checkpoint there is a possibility that I could be deported, so it's especially scary with four children you know that I'm responsible for,\" adds the 32-year-old from Grimes.\u003cbr/\u003e              The reported surge of visa troubles comes at a time when hopes for a negotiated solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict seem to have dissipated.\u003cbr/\u003e              The Palestinians seek a state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem - lands Israel captured in 1967. But negotiations broke down four years ago due to deep disagreements over key issues. Continued Israeli settlement expansion, along with an internal Palestinian political split between pragmatists and militants, have pushed a partition deal even further out of reach.\u003cbr/\u003e              Last month, US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital prompted Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to slam the door on more than two decades of intermittent and ultimately unsuccessful US-led negotiations. \u003cbr/\u003e              Some of those affected by the visa restrictions have filed court appeals.\u003cbr/\u003e              Others have revived a \"Right to Enter\" campaign that was first created more than a decade ago to fight similar troubles. Activists said they've urged their diplomatic missions to exert pressure on Israel.\u003cbr/\u003e              At the West Bank's Bir Zeit University, 15 foreign teachers face visa problems, including department heads, according to spokeswoman Tina Rafidi.\u003cbr/\u003e              The Arab American University in the town of Jenin lost the dean of its business faculty and a veteran English language professor when their visa extensions were denied in 2017.\u003cbr/\u003e              The US Consulate in Jerusalem has said that it is aware of the issue and takes it seriously, but cannot comment on private immigration or legal matters.\u003cbr/\u003e            \u003cbr/\u003e\u003cbr/\u003e              Jerusalem - 17 January 2018\u003cbr/\u003e              1. Various of student and guitar teacher\u003cbr/\u003e              2. SOUNDBITE (English) Suhail Khoury, Director of Edward Said National Conservatory of Music: \u003cbr/\u003e              \"It's absolutely incredible, I mean what are we supposed to do? They (Israel) deny work visas. They deny West Bank authority visas. They don't want people to be here. I mean why don't you want people to come and teach classical Western music? What's the problem? What is Israel's problem with teaching Western classical music?\"\u003cbr/\u003e              3. Close of hands ++MUTE++\u003cbr/\u003e              4. SOUNDBITE (English) Suhail Khoury, Director of Edward Said National Conservatory of Music: \u003cbr/\u003e              \"So, it's a big issue and a big mess and it might jeopardise the whole teaching process at this school because there are more than 20 teachers, international teachers that we have and they have hundreds of students.\"\u003cbr/\u003e              5. Various of students at music school during lessons\u003cbr/\u003e              6. Wide of sign for the music school\u003cbr/\u003e              7. Wide of Edward Said National Conservatory of Music music conservatory in Jerusalem\u003cbr/\u003e              \u003cbr/\u003e              Ramallah, West Bank - 18 January 2018\u003cbr/\u003e              8. Wide of Sam Bahour activist\u003cbr/\u003e              9. SOUNDBITE (English) Sam Bahour, activist in the Right to Enter Campaign: \u003cbr/\u003e              \"We are being faced with a renewal of increased restrictions from Israel on foreign nationals that are in the occupied territory in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. They are not renewing visas or allowing foreign nationals to reach their jobs or to allow volunteers to reach their churches. This has become problematic in terms of families being able to stay together and we are facing this impact that's happening across the board in our society, whether it's businesses that are losing staff, schools that are losing professors and teachers, or churches that are losing their volunteers. So we are affected by this in a very serious way and it seems as if the Israeli goal is to get Palestinians to leave Palestine and take their foreign national spouses with them.\"\u003cbr/\u003e              10. Wide of Ramallah\u003cbr/\u003e              11. Various of Iowa-born Kate Hamad and her children\u003cbr/\u003e              12. SOUNDBITE (English) Kate Hamad, foreign spouse of Palestinian: \u003cbr/\u003e              \"When my visa renewal was denied, obviously it was very upsetting. I didn't come to Palestine with any ideas that this would be a problem, obviously. So, I was really shocked and I didn't know what to do. My husband and I talked and we, you know, we decided that the best thing to do was to appeal the decision and we're still waiting on the appeal decision and so right now our life is just completely in limbo. We don't know what we should do, what's the best option, there are so many things going through our mind constantly.\"\u003cbr/\u003e              12. Mid of child\u003cbr/\u003e              13. SOUNDBITE (English) Kate Hamad, foreign spouse of Palestinian: \u003cbr/\u003e              \"So, basically I can't leave Ramallah. Anywhere where there is a checkpoint there is a possibility that I could be deported, so it's especially scary with four children you know that I'm responsible for. So, I don't take that chance and I just stay inside Ramallah. It's scary, I mean, not being able to leave an area and then knowing what could happen if you did. It's very scary. It's not comfortable at all.\"\u003cbr/\u003e              14. Various of Hamad with her children\u003cbr/\u003e              15. 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