NGO-Monitor: Statement on Amnesty International-UK's Rejection of a Resolution to Campaign against Antisemitism

Press Release  April 21, 2015   Contact: Yakira Heller NGO Monitor 058-668-9603 yakira.heller@ngo-monitor.org  Statement on Amnesty International-UK's Rejection of a Resolution to Campaign against Antisemitism Jerusalem - Amnesty International-UK's (AIUK) decision to reject a campaign against antisemitism in the UK highlights the hypocrisy and moral bankruptcy of what was once a leader in human rights advocacy. On April 19, AIUK held its 2015 Annual General Meeting, and adopted 16 of 17 motions. The only proposed resolution that was rejected called on AIUK to "Campaign against anti-Semitism in the UK," as well as "Lobby the UK Government to tackle the rise in anti-Semitic attacks in Britain" and "monitor anti-semitism closely." According to the motion, "neither AIUK nor the [Amnesty] International Secretariat have undertaken research or campaigning work specifically on anti-Semitism in the UK."

NGO Monitor: Amnesty International Report Reflects Lack of Expertise and Methodology

NGO Monitor: Amnesty International Report Reflects Lack of Expertise and Methodology Report based on faulty data calls for sanctions, coincides with annual BDS campaign Jerusalem - A report scheduled to be released by Amnesty International tomorrow, Trigger-happy: Israel's use of excessive force in the West Bank, falsely and maliciously accuses Israel of "callous disregard for human life," according to analysis by NGO Monitor, a Jerusalem-based research organization. The report also repeats Amnesty's calls for political warfare against Israel, in the form of an arms embargo. "Amnesty International accusations are reckless, blatantly biased, and reflect the lack of a credible research fact-finding methodology," said Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor. "Amnesty lacks the expertise and credibility to analyze or assign blame for deaths in the context of violent confrontations in the West Bank. As in the past, the allegations in this report repeat unverifiable Palestinian 'testimony.'" Indeed, in a February 10 interview with Al Jazeera, Amnesty International's Secretary General Salil Shetty acknowledged that "we are not an expert (sic) on military matters. So we don't want to, kind of, pontificate on issues we don't really understand."

Ideology and Media Coverage Drive Amnesty and Human Rights Watch Failure of Women in Middle East

For Immediate Release December 10, 2013  Contact: Emily Ziedman NGO Monitor 052-528-1500 emily.ziedman@ngo-monitor.org

New Report: Powerful NGOs Fail Women in the Middle East Ideology and Media Coverage Drive Amnesty and Human Rights Watch Photo credit: AP; for illustrative purposes only  Jerusalem - Marking International Human Rights Day (December 10), NGO Monitor is publishingSecond Class Rights: How Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch Fail Women in the Middle East. This four-part report evaluates Amnesty International's and Human Rights Watch's coverage of women's rights in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region from 1995-2012. The absence of freedom for women in the Middle East is one of the most acute human rights problems in the world today and one of the most significant challenges for the region. NGO Monitor's qualitative and quantitative study shows that while Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW) project a strong image of prioritizing women's freedom, in reality their advocacy on behalf of women's rights in the MENA region is weak.

NGO Monitor: Human Wrongs: The Worst of Amnesty, HRW, and others in 2011

PRESS RELEASE December 20, 2011 Contact: Jason Edelstein NGO Monitor +972-52-861-2129 mail@ngo-monitor.org

Human Wrongs: The Worst of Amnesty, HRW, and others in 2011 JERUSALEM -  With 2011 concluding, NGO Monitor today released a list of the most outrageous and absurd NGO actions from the past year, demonstrating the political nature of NGOs involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor, commented, "This shows how the NGO network consistently fails to uphold universal human rights, while also distorting international law beyond recognition." The list: Amnesty International's new Israel Researcher has a history of radical anti-Israel activism.   HRW's Sarah Leah Whitson race-baited American Jews and ignored the embarrassment of having praised Saif-Islam Qaddafi as a human rights reformer.   German NGO "Remembrance, Responsibility, and Future (EVZ)" exploited government funding designated for Holocaust reparations and education in order to join the delegitimization campaign against Israel and added to new antisemitism.

NGO Monitor Blasts Amnesty For Not Sufficiently Condemning Those Launching Rockets At Israel

NGO Monitor is closely tracking NGO statements regarding the August 18 terrorist attacks in Israel. Amnesty International's statement makes a false comparison between the murder of Israeli civilians and the subsequent response of the Israel Defense Forces, and omits key details about the events. Our analysis was featured in the Jerusalem Post story below.

NGO Monitor blasts Amnesty for not sufficiently condemning those launching rockets at Israel AI says Israel puts civilians at risk, while Gerald Steinberg, NGO Monitor's president, says the rights group 'draws a false equivalence' and 'makes a complete mockery of international law'    August 23, 2011 The Jerusalem-based human rights watchdog organization NGO Monitor sharply criticized Amnesty International's response to last week's Palestinian attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers, which resulted in the killing of eight Israelis and scores of wounded. Prof. Gerald Steinberg, NGO Monitor president, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday that "instead of issuing a strong condemnation of the August 18 Palestinian terror attacks, Amnesty International's statement draws a false equivalence between cold-blooded murder and self defense that targeted those responsible."

Look Who's Persecuting Their Arab Minority!

Persecution of an Arab minority.
Confiscation of Arab land.
Ethnic cleansing.

It's just another day in...Iran.

From The Times Online:

“NEVER AGAIN” is, I fear, a phrase that we may hear again all too soon — but too late to warn people, let alone save lives. Under the cover of secrecy the fundamentalist regime in Tehran is waging a sustained, bloody campaign of intimidation and persecution against its Arab minority. These Arabs believe that they are victims of “ethnic cleansing” by Iran’s Persian majority.

Sixteen Arab rights activists have been sentenced to death, according to reports in the Iranian media. They were found guilty of insurgency in secret trials before revolutionary courts. But most of the defendants were convicted solely on the basis of confessions extracted under torture. Ten are expected to be hanged in a couple of weeks, after the end of Ramadan. Amnesty International says that two of those sentenced to die, Abdolreza Nawaseri and Nazem Bureihi, were in prison when they were alleged to have been involved in bomb attacks. Three others — Hamza Sawa- eri, Jafar Sawari and Reisan Sawari — say that they were nowhere near the Zergan oilfield the day it was bombed.

The death sentences seem designed to silence protests by Iran’s persecuted ethnic Arabs. They comprise 70 per cent of the population of the south-west province of Khuzestan, known locally as Ahwaz. Many Ahwazis believe that the 16 were framed and that their real “crime” was campaigning against Tehran’s repression and exploitation of their oil-rich homeland.

Further show trials are planned — 50 Ahwazi Arab activists have been charged with insurgency since last year. They are accused of being mohareb or enemies of God, which is a capital crime. Other allegations include sabotage and possession of home-made bombs. No material evidence has been offered to support the charges. All face possible execution.

...Tehran’s latest tactic is to hold Ahwazi children as hostages. According to Amnesty International, children as young as 2 have been jailed with their mothers to force their fugitive, political-activist fathers to surrender to the police. Protests against these abuses are brutally suppressed. Ahwazi political parties, trade unions and student groups are illegal. In the past year, 25,000 Ahwazis have been arrested, 131 executed and 150 have disappeared, reports AHRO. The bodies of many of those executed have been dumped in a place that the Government calls lanat abad, the place of the damned. They are buried in shallow graves; dogs dig up and eat the bodies.

Nearly 250,000 Arabs have been displaced from their villages after the Iranian Government’s confiscation of more than 200,000 hectares of farmland for a huge sugar-cane project. Dozens more towns and villages will be erased, making a possible further 400,000 Ahwazis homeless, by the creation of a military-industrial security zone, covering more than 3,000 sq km, along the Shatt al-Arab waterway, which borders Iraq.

And guess who is playing into this persecution of Arabs--

Ironically, the Hezbollah in Lebanon — the supposed embodiment of Arab resistance in the Middle East — is complicit in the displacement of Ahwazi Arabs. On confiscated Arab land Tehran has set up training camps for Hezbollah and for the Badr Brigades, the Iraqi fundamentalist militia. Badr death squads in Iraq are murdering Sunnis, unveiled women, gay people, men wearing shorts, barbers, sellers of alcohol and people listening to Western music.

Then there is the ethic cleansing part.

Tehran has a grand plan to make the Ahwazi a minority in their own land through “ethnic restructuring”. Financial incentives, such as zero- interest loans, are given to ethnic Persians to settle in Ahwaz. New townships are planned, which will house 500,000 non-Arabs. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of displaced Ahwazis eke out a subsistence existence in shanty towns on the outskirts of Ahwaz city. Others have been forcibly relocated to poverty-stricken, far-flung northern regions of Iran.

The rest:

Ahwaz produces 90 per cent of Iran’s oil and Tehran expropriates all the revenues. An attempt by Ahwaz MPs to secure the repatriation of 1.5 per cent of these earnings back to the region for welfare projects was rejected this year. Yet it is the third poorest region of Iran: 80 per cent of the children suffer from malnutrition, and the unemployment rate of Arabs is more than five times that of Persians.

Arab language newspapers and textbooks have been banned to crush Arab identity further. In Ahwaz schools, all instruction is in Farsi (Persian), resulting in a 30 per cent drop-out rate at primary level and 50 per cent at secondary level. Illiteracy rates among Arabs are at least four times those of non-Arabs.

Contrary to Tehran’s nationalist propaganda most Ahwazi Arabs just want a measure of self-government; they are not hellbent on independence or in league with the CIA or plotting for an American invasion. Quite the contrary, they fear that Western sabre-rattling will be used as a pretext by Tehran’s hardliners to crack down savagely on dissent. Which makes it all the more disturbing that one of the few bodies with diplomatic muscle — the Arab League, which professes pan-Arab solidarity — is so silent in the face of Iran’s persecution of Arabs.

No world condemnation.
No fiery Arab rhetoric.
No UN denounciation

Just another quiet day in the Middle East--move along; nothing to see here.

Any question that Israel is not the only one that need worry about Iran?

Technorati Tag: Iran and Hezbollah.

Has Amnesty International Seen The Light?

On September 4, the NGO Monitor came out with a report: Amnesty continues to distort human rights rhetoric to attack Israeli actions in Lebanon, documenting what they politely called "problematic statements" made by the group during Israel's war with Hezbollah:

By artificially separating Hezbollah attacks from the Israeli responses, the analysis lacks credibility, inverts the priority of core human rights values and glosses over Hezbollah's missile attacks and use of human shields. Similarly, the authors have erased the context, including Syrian and Iranian support and provision of missiles to Hezbollah, while claiming a level of military expertise where none is evident. In addition, the conclusions are based on unverifiable evidence provided by "eyewitnesses" in Lebanon, whose may be strongly influenced by support for or threats from Hezbollah. As a result, this report is internally inconsistent, lacks credibility, and should be seen as a political statement rather than a careful evaluation of human rights issues.

But then, just 10 days later, the Boston Herald reported on that very same Amnesty International, which seems to have done an abrupt about-face:

Amnesty International has introduced a comprehensive report accusing a terrorist group of war crimes.In utter defiance of the predominant American left, European and United Nations view that Israel engaged in gross war crimes against civilians and freedom fighters in Lebanon, Amnesty International has announced that in its opinion, Hezbollah is guilty of war crimes. Hezbollah purposefully and indiscriminately targeted Israeli civilians.

The AI report notes that despite Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s subsequent protestations to the contrary, he stated publicly and repeatedly during the conflict that he was firing his missiles at civilian areas to make Israeli civilians pay for their army’s actions, and with his uncontrolled Katyushas, an indiscriminate weapon, he killed 43 of them. He had advised Israeli Arabs to leave those areas.He had provoked the war with a cross border attack in which some Israeli soldiers were killed and others seized.

Now the question is whether Amnesty International, with the publication of this new report, is changing its approach or is merely trying to look respectable--after all, besides emphasizing the actions of Israel vis-a-vis Hezbollah, AI has also been a persistent if not single-minded critic of the United States as well in its war against terrorism.

Alex Margolin, NGO's publication manager, responded in an email that he believes that AI has taken a small step that distinguishes it from other groups, such as Human Rights Watch.

But despite its length and detail, the report remains incomplete as long as Amnesty fails to address the serious issues surrounding Hezbollah's use of human shields and the impact their war tactics had on the Lebanese civilians. Amnesty must follow through with detailed studies of the situation, and be open to revising their earlier claims about Israel's role in the deaths of Lebanese civilians should the facts show that Hezbollah were actually responsible.

As far as what is behind the report, I think it is a simple question of credibility. Human Rights Watch has experienced an unprecedented level of criticism for their biased work on the war in Lebanon -- the Weekly Standard ran a cover story on this, and there have been numerous op-eds. Amnesty had already released a 50-page report that focused exclusively on Israel's actions. It doesn't take an expert in international humanitarian law to know that firing 4000 Katyushas on residential areas is a war crime. If Amnesty refused to look at the situation honestly, how could it be taken seriously?

It is reassuring to see that such groups actually are not impervious to public scrutiny and criticism--and maybe we'll see a similar turn-around from HRW as well. The effectiveness of such scrutiny only emphasizes the need to keep these kinds of issues in the limelight and part of public discussion.

As for the AI report itself, according to the Boston Herald, it still did not deal with the question of the estimated 1,000 Lebanese civilians who were killed in the populated areas where Hezbollah and set up command positions. They said the issue is too complex to comment on.

It is too important not to.
AI needs to realize that.

Crossposted at Israpundit

Technorati Tag: Israel and Hezbollah and Amnesty International and lebanon.

Human Rights Watch: Human Rights Vs. Human Life

On August 17, Kenneth Roth,Executive Director of Human Rights Watch in New York, wrote a column in the Jerusalem Post explaining HRW's position on Israel's war with Hezbollah. Roth's intent is clear from the start:

Why did so many Lebanese civilians lost their lives to Israeli bombing? The government line is that the IDF was doing the best it could, but these deaths were the result of Hizbullah hiding its rockets and fighters among civilians. But that assertion doesn't stand up to the facts.

Roth graciously grants that Hezbollah 'sometimes' hid among Lebanese civilians, and 'possibly' committed the war crime of using civilian shields, but insists that in the 2 dozen instances of Israeli bombings of Lebanon that they investigated--"in none of those cases was Hizbullah anywhere around at the time of the attack."

Roth insists HRW knows this based on their procedure:

We probed and cross-checked multiple eyewitnesses, many of whom talked openly of Hizbullah's presence elsewhere but were adamant that Hizbullah was not at the scene of the attack. We examined bombing sites for evidence of military activity such as trenches, destroyed rocket launchers and military equipment, or dead or wounded fighters. If we were unsure, we gave the IDF the benefit of the doubt.

The case of Kana shows how this works.

Kana is a solid example of how HRW works? OK, let's take a look at Kana. On July 30, HRW reported:

Responsibility for the Israeli airstrikes that killed at least 54 civilians sheltering in a home in the Lebanese village of Qana rests squarely with the Israeli military, Human Rights Watch said today. It is the latest product of an indiscriminate bombing campaign that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have waged in Lebanon over the past 18 days, leaving an estimated 750 people dead, the vast majority of them civilians.

Then, 3 days later, on August 2, HRW reports its correction:

A preliminary Human Rights Watch investigation into the July 30 Israeli air strike in Qana found that 28 people are confirmed dead thus far, among them 16 children, Human Rights Watch said today.

The initial estimate of 54 persons killed was based on a register of 63 persons who had sought shelter in the basement of the building that was struck, and rescue teams having located nine survivors. It now appears that at least 22 people escaped the basement, and 28 are confirmed dead, according to records from the Lebanese Red Cross and the government hospital in Tyre.

Questions:

o If the second report is preliminary, what was the first one 3 days earlier--the erroneous one that HRW widely circulated?

o According to Roth, HRW investigations are full of probes and cross-checking of eyewitnesses as well as the investigation of the physical evidence. But at Kana, Roth's prime example of HRW's methods, there was apparently no checking with survivors--or did survivors confirm the higher numbers?

o Reporters have noted Hezbollah's presence, control, and intimidation. Was Hezbollah present during HRW's investigations and influence those interviewed? Since Hezbollah does not wear uniforms, how would HRW know? For that matter, what steps are taken by HRW to insure that their own members are not manipulated by Hezbollah in the way reporters have admitted they were?

o Moreover, since Hezbollah does not wear a uniform, how does HRW determine which casualties are Hezbollah and which are not?

In another well-crafted paragraph, Roth says:

But under international humanitarian law, just as Israeli abuses in Lebanon did not justify reprisals against Israeli civilians, so Hizbullah's war crimes did not justify Israel shirking its duty to protect Lebanese civilians.

First, Roth combines the idea of law and humanitarianism, which he utilizes later when he reinterprets international law. But what Roth also slips in is the insinuation that Hezbollah's thousands of bombs sent indiscriminately into Israel were neither acts of war nor terror but merely reprisals in response to so-called Israeli abuses in Lebanon.

But this paragraph takes the cake:

But giving warning, as required by international humanitarian law, does not relieve the attacker of the duty to distinguish between civilians and combatants and to target only combatants. Otherwise, Palestinian militants might "warn" Israeli settlers to leave their West Bank settlements and then be justified in attacking anyone who remained. Hizbullah might have done the same in northern Israel.

What "international humanitarian law" is Roth referring to here? Not the Geneva Convention. Roth claims that even after warning, Israel has "the duty to distinguish between civilians and combatants and to target only combatants." [emphasis added]

Roth is deceptive. By inventing the term "international humanitarian law" Roth clouds the issue--the Geneva Convention is a set of rules for the ugly, but often unavoidable, conduct of war, and does not forbid attacks where civilian lives are at risk. The avoidance of injury and casualty to civilians is desireable, but is not always possible. Thus the Geneva Convention, Chapter IV, Article 57 includes:

...(ii) Take all feasible precautions in the choice of means and methods of attack with a view to avoiding, and in any event to minimizing, incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects;

(iii) Refrain from deciding to launch any attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated; [in this case the prevention of the indiscriminate bombing of Israel, including the hospital in Haifa]
...

(c) Effective advance warning shall be given of attacks which may affect the civilian population, unless circumstances do not permit.

3. When a choice is possible between several military objectives for obtaining a similar military advantage, the objective to be selected shall be that the attack on which may be expected to cause the least danger to civilian lives and to civilian objects. [as opposed to forbidding the attack altogether]

Of course one can argue about Israel's attacks in the context of the outline of Article 57 , but by deceptively muddying the waters with talk of an "international humanitarian law," Roth implies the existence of law that exceeds what the Geneva Convention itself recognizes as legitimate.

Roth digs deeper into absurdity in that same paragraph:

Otherwise, Palestinian militants might "warn" Israeli settlers to leave their West Bank settlements and then be justified in attacking anyone who remained. Hizbullah might have done the same in northern Israel.

Since Palestinian militants terrorists make a point of targeting innocent women and children, in direct contradistinction to Israel's targeting of terrorists, Roth's argument is faulty--and by implying a justification of Palestinian terrorist attacks, insulting as well.

Roth concludes with his personal interpretation of how Israel should conduct war according to "international humanitarian law," a term he uses 3 times but never identifies:

It means attacking civilian structures and vehicles only if there is evidence that Hizbullah is actually using them. Even then, it means making serious efforts to determine whether civilian structures and vehicles contain civilians, and attacking only if the definite military advantage is so powerful that it justifies their deaths.

Above all, it means treating Lebanese civilians as human beings whose lives are as valuable as Israelis'. Protecting Israelis from Hizbullah's deadly rockets is vital, but it does not justify indifference to the taking of civilian lives on the other side of the border.

Roth has an obligation to ground his assumptions about international law in actual sources. His failure to do so is a reflection of his flight into fantasy, where abstract ideas of Human Rights take precedence over real threats to Human Life.

See also The Decline of Amnesty International at the Volokh Conspiracy
and
Human Rights Watch's Credibility--Not So Good

Technorati Tag: Israel and HRW and Lebanon and Hizbollah and Hezbollah and Geneva Convention.

Let's Give Them a Warm Welcome

According to Herb Keinon in the Jerusalem Post:

Former OC Southern Command and IDF Gaza chief, Maj.-Gen. (Res.) Doron Almog, decided not to disembark from an El-Al plane that landed in London on Sunday afternoon after information that reached the Israeli Foreign Ministry indicated that a Palestinian from Birmingham had filed a lawsuit against Almog for crimes against humanity, allegedly committed while Almog served as IDF Gaza chief.

The basis for the charge apparently comes from Amnesty International, which claims that:

"Certain abuses committed by the Israeli army constituted crimes against humanity and war crimes, including unlawful killings, extensive and wanton destruction of property, obstruction of medical assistance and targeting of medical personnel, torture and the use of Palestinians as 'human shields,'' the Amnesty International (AI) report, which covered 2004, charged.

I wonder how AI feels about the summary execution of Palestinian Arabs accused of collaborating with Israel--would those qualify as unlawful killings?
Would the burning of the synagogues in Gaza qualify as wanton destruction of property?
Does the hiding of Palestinian terrorists behind and among their fellow Palestinians qualify as the use of Palestinians as human shields?

Maybe it's time for Israel to make their own list of PA officials who are guilty of crimes against humanity.

Maybe after having started the ball rolling by suing the PA in court for damages, the next step is to have someone in the US--or in England--file a lawsuit the next time Abbas or his friends come to town.

Technorati Tag: Israel. and Israel.