An American student of Palestinian descent detained in Israel's airport for nearly a fortnight has become an unexpected cause celebre. Lara Alqasem was refused entry under legislation passed last year against boycott activists, and Israeli courts are now deciding whether allowing her to study human rights at an Israeli university threatens public order.
Usually those held at the border are swiftly deported, but Ms Alqasem appealed against the decision, becoming in the process an improbable "prisoner of conscience" for the boycott cause.
The Israeli government, led by strategic affairs minister Gilad Erdan, claims that the 22-year-old is a leader of the growing international boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement. Activists like Ms Alqasem, he argues, demonise Israel.
Two lower courts have already ruled against the student. Israel's supreme court has postponed her deportation until Wednesday while it reconsiders the evidence. But refusing to go quietly, Ms Alqasem is attracting increasing international attention to her plight.
So far Israeli officials have shown only that Ms Alqasem once belonged to a small Palestinian solidarity group at a Florida university that backed boycotting a hummus company over its donations to the Israeli army.
Under pressure, Ms Alqasem has disavowed a boycott of Israel, citing as proof her decision to enrol in a masters programme in Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
Given the blanket hostility in Israel to the boycott movement, Ms Alqasem has found a surprisingly wide array of allies in her legal struggle.
Members of the small Zionist-left Meretz party visited her and demanded she be allowed to attend the course, which began on Sunday.
Ami Ayalon, a retired head of the Shin Bet, the secret police that oversees security checks at Israel's borders, warned that the agency was now "a problem for democracy" in repeatedly denying foreigners entry.
Vice-chancellors of eight Israeli universities sent a letter of protest to the government and 500 academics at Hebrew University submitted a petition decrying Ms Alqasem's incarceration.
The solidarity has been unprecedented -- and perplexing.
Israeli officials control entry not only to Israel but also to the occupied Palestinian territories. For decades, foreigners with Arab-sounding names -- like Ms Alqasem -- have been routinely harassed or turned back at the borders, with barely a peep from most on the Israeli left.
And over the same period, Israel has stripped many thousands of Palestinians from the occupied territories of the right to return to their homeland after living abroad. These abuses, too, have rarely troubled consciences in Israel.
So what makes Ms Alqasem's case different? The answer confers little credit on liberal Israelis.
Israel's universities are worried that the academic boycott has highlighted their long-term complicity in Israel's occupation and is gradually eroding their international standing. Joint research projects with foreign universities are in jeopardy, as is their lucrative income from programmes they wish to expand for overseas students.
The universities want to co-opt Ms Alqasem as a poster girl for academic freedom in Israel.
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