Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

BDS Founder Omar Barghouti Barred From Traveling To U.S.

U.S. officials barred Omar Barghouti, the Palestinian activist who co-founded the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement, from traveling to the U.S. on Wednesday, NPR reported

Barghouti was scheduled to speak at a number of events, including one on Thursday in Washington, D.C., alongside Forward columnist Peter Beinart. Barghouti was also planning to attend his daughter’s wedding.

“It is disturbing that policymakers and the American people will not have the opportunity to hear from Omar directly about his views,” James Zogby, the president of the Arab American Institute, which arranged his travel, told NPR.

According to NPR, airline officials at Ben Gurion Airport told Barghouti that he would not be permitted to fly. The Arab American Institute told NPR that Barghouti had valid travel documents.

Barghouti is a major leader in the BDS movement, and was one of its founders.

The decision to bar Barghouti from visiting the U.S. drew immediate condemnation from Debra Shushan, director of policy and government relations at Americans for Peace Now. “This move by the US govt is outrageous,” Shushan tweeted.

On Thursday morning, Barghouti appears to have appeared via livestream at the scheduled panel with Beinart.

Contact Josh Nathan-Kazis at [email protected]

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.