Israeli Woman Held at Airport Takes DNA Test Over Girl’s Identity

Passengers check-in using a new security machine as part of measures to increase security
JACK GUEZ/AFP/Getty

NBC News reports: TEL AVIV — An Israeli passenger held at an airport for five days has taken a DNA test to prove she is the mother of her child after authorities questioned the girl’s origin when the pair arrived from Sri Lanka.

Galit Nakash, 48, has been at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport since Saturday when immigration officials denied the baby permission to enter the country because of concerns over her identity.

Nakash says she gave birth unexpectedly in her seventh month of pregnancy while on a business trip to Sri Lanka. The girl has a Sri Lankan passport in the name of Tahel.

Israeli officials told NBC News that Nakash had refused to take a DNA test for Israeli consular officials in Sri Lanka or neighboring India and that documents she presented at the airport on Saturday — the girl’s birth certificate and her own birth certificate — were not signed and verified by authorities.

Sabin Hadad, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry’s Population Administration Authority, said Nakash somehow used a child’s passport issued to a family in central Israel with the same first name “Tahel” in order to fly from Sri Lanka via Turkey. However, she presented the girl’s Sri Lankan passport to Israeli officials upon arrival.

“Meanwhile, the Israeli passport has disappeared,” Hadad said.

Read more here.

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