OCCUPIED JERUSALEM: Israel Sunday deported 36 pro-Palestinian activists who were taken into custody after flying into Israel for protests over the weekend, an official said.

Two other activists were deported overnight, leaving 82 still in Israeli custody awaiting flights back to home.

“Now on their way to their flights are 36 people, 35 of them will leave on a Lufthansa flight and one person is going on an Alitalia flight,” immigration service spokeswoman Sabine Hadad told AFP.

Those being deported were 22 Belgians, 13 Germans and one Spaniard, Hadad said. Two other Belgians were sent home earlier.

Israel was hoping to deport the remainder, she said.

“We hope it will be possible to return them to their home countries in the next 48 hours. It will depend on what spaces are available on departing flights,” she added.

The activists are currently being held in prisons in Beersheva in southern Israel and in Ramleh, near Tel Aviv.

Most of the activists being held are French, but nationals from the United States, Belgium, Bulgaria, Holland and Spain were also in detention.

The activists were taking part in the “Welcome to Palestine” campaign in which up to 800 activists planned to fly to Israel and head to the Palestinian territories on a peaceful mission to visit Palestinian families.

Israeli authorities mobilized diplomatic and security forces to try to head off the incoming activists.

Officials said that by notifying foreign airlines of ticket-holders who would not be admitted to Israel, they had prevented hundreds of people from boarding at their ports of departure.

Of those who managed to arrive, four activists from Germany and Holland were authorized to stay after giving a written commitment “not to provoke disorder” and “to avoid places of (Israeli-Palestinian) confrontation.”

The “Welcome to Palestine” campaign took place as a flotilla of ships trying to break a blockade on Gaza was prevented from leaving Greece.

The timing of the fly-in campaign led some to dub it a “flytilla,” although activists denied their mission was linked to the attempt to run the blockade.

In the West Bank, Palestinians and foreigners protested Sunday in front of a section of Israel’s controversial separation barrier at the main entrance of Bethlehem, marking the seventh anniversary of a ruling by the International Court of Justice in the Hague that termed illegal Israel’s construction of the 720-km barrier in the Israeli occupied West Bank.

Several thousand Israeli Arabs Saturday had protested in Nazareth against the detention in Britain of controversial Islamist leader Sheikh Raed Saleh who faces deportation.

An AFP journalist said around 4,000 people, among them Arab members of the Israeli parliament, marched through the town in northern Israel holding pictures of the imam and chanting, “We are all Sheikh Saleh.”

The demonstration, which had been authorized by police and passed off peacefully, was called by the Islamic Movement to demand the immediate release of its leader.

Saleh flew to Britain at the end of June, despite a government ban on him entering the country.

He was arrested in London June 28 after returning from a public event in the central English city of Leicester, one of several he was attending during a week-long visit, his lawyers said.

Meanwhile, a senior Palestinian official said that the Middle East peacemaking Quartet, which meets Monday in Washington, must take “decisive action” to restart peace talks.

In a statement issued ahead of the meeting of representatives from the United States., United Nations, European Union and Russia, Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi urged the Quartet to “undertake its responsibilities seriously.”

The group is expected to discuss ways to restart stalled peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, in a bid to head off Palestinian attempts to seek membership at the United Nations in September.

The Palestinians have said they will not be deterred from seeking U.N. membership, but that they remain open to new talks if they are based on clear guidelines and Israel stops settlement construction during negotiations.

“It is clear that if there is to be any genuine political momentum and progress, then the Quartet has to undertake its responsibilities seriously,” said Ashrawi, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization.

She called on the group to commit to clear guidelines and a timeframe for any new talks, and to “effectively bring Israel to compliance, including a cessation of all settlement activities.”

Talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down shortly after they restarted in September 2010 when Israel declined to renew a partial freeze on settlement construction in the West Bank.

The Palestinians have accused Washington of failing to insist on a new moratorium and weakening the Quartet’s position on settlement construction, which much of the international community regards as illegal.

“The U.S. must not again undermine its own standing and any prospects for peace by diluting the Quartet’s political position or preventing positive engagement on the part of the international community,” Ashrawi said.

“The Quartet must exhibit the political will to translate words into action. Until this happens there will be no change to the current status quo.”