A pro-Palestinian activist has held a speech via video link outside a building at Nijmegen’s Radboud University after he was banned by the Dutch government and campus authorities.

Mohammed Khatib was due to give a lecture on the treatment of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, but the event was cancelled after he was refused entry to the country by justice minister David van Weel and asylum minister Marjolein Faber.

The university refused to allow students to follow the lecture online in the Spinoza building, prompting the organisers to move it to a nearby field. A demonstration protesting against Khatib’s exclusion was organised by a group called Nijmegen Encampment.

Khatib, 34, is the chairman of Samidoun, an international organisation that campaigns for the rights of Palestinian prisoners. But foreign governments, including the US, Canada and Germany, have banned it for its alleged links with terrorist organisations.

Khatib has publicly expressed support for Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), which are both listed as proscribed organisations by the US, and called the attacks in Israel on October 7 last year “a normal answer by a people that has been under siege since 2006”.

Khatib denied any formal links with the PFLP and said he would fight his exclusion in the Dutch courts.

Legal challenge

An internal memo by officials at the immigration service IND and the counter-terrorism co-ordinator’s office warned that there was “insufficient legal basis” to stop Khatib from entering the country and the ban was likely to be overturned, according to the Volkskrant, which says it has seen a copy.

But Van Weel said on social media site X, better known as Twitter, that there was “no place in our country for fomenting hatred and glorifying violence, including online”.

Dhr. Khatib houdt helaas zijn toespraak in Nijmegen waarschijnlijk digitaal. Wat minister Faber @MinisterAenM en mij betreft is hij niet welkom in Nederland. Voor het verspreiden van haat en verheerlijken van geweld is geen plek in ons land, ook niet online. 1/2

— David van Weel (@ministerjenv) October 28, 2024

Teaching staff at the university called the ban “an attack on academic freedom” and “yet another example of anti-Palestinian racism by a government that supports and facilitates genocide in Gaza”.

Prime minister Dick Schoof asked the public prosecution service two weeks ago to consider permanently banning Samidoun from the Netherlands, while the cabinet is also investigating the possibility of a Europe-wide ban.