tes, told Al Jazeera that he and his wife, fellow legal scholar Hilal Elver , were stopped at Toronto Pearson International Airport on Thursday. According to Falk, a security officer approached them and said: “We’ve detained you both because we’re concerned that you pose a national security threat to Canada.” He added, “It was my first experience of this sort in my entire life.” The couple — both US citizens — were heading to Ottawa to participate in the Palestine Tribunal on Canadian Responsibility , held on Friday and Saturday. The tribunal brought together international legal and human rights experts to examine Canada’s involvement in Israel’s two-year bombardment of Gaza, which a UN inquiry and several rights groups have described as genocide . Falk said he and Elver were questioned for more than four hours about their research and work relating to Israel, Gaza, and issues of genocide in general. He noted that the questioning was not aggressive but felt “random and disorganised”. However, Falk believes the interrogation is part of a broader global effort to “punish those who try to tell the truth about what is happening,” particularly in Gaza.