I guess Human Rights Watch, along with other Nazi-ISIS organizations like UNICEF and Doctors Without Borders, are all part of a vast antisemitic conspiracy.
funny you should ask:
Criticism regarding the Arab–Israeli conflict
Allegations of anti-Israel bias
HRW has been accused of bias against Israel and having an anti-Israeli agenda.
Robert Bernstein wrote that by focusing on Israel and neglecting human rights violations by less free states in the Middle East that HRW had cast "aside its important distinction between open and closed societies." In response, Aryeh Neier HRW co-founder and former executive director said, it "is wrong to suggest that open societies should be spared criticism for human rights abuses". Neier also said that Robert Bernstein's distinction between "wrongs committed in self-defense and those committed intentionally" is not made by the laws of war and is dangerous. "On such grounds, groups such as al-Qaeda in Iraq" (which "murdered tens of thousands of civilians after" the 2003 American invasion) could justify their crimes.
Writing in the
Wall Street Journal in 2009 about a controversial fundraising event that HRW held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Noah Pollak stated that the organization displayed a strong bias against Israel. Pollak observed that from 2006 to 2009 Human Rights Watch's reports on the Israeli-Arab conflict had been almost entirely devoted to condemning Israel (87 criticisms of Israeli conduct against the Palestinians and Hezbollah, versus eight criticisms of Palestinian groups and four of Hezbollah for attacks on Israel).
For a
Jerusalem Post article,
Natan Sharansky said: "Here is an organization created by the goodwill of the free world to fight violations of human rights, which has become a tool in the hands of dictatorial regimes to fight against democracies ... It is time to call a spade a spade. The real activity of this organization today is a far cry from what it was set up 30 years ago to do: throw light in dark places where there is really no other way to find out what is happening regarding human rights." HRW executive director
Kenneth Roth responded that "Israel accounts for about 15 percent of our published output on the region" and "our war coverage in the region has documented violations by all sides". According to Roth, "By failing to hold those responsible to account, Israel increases anger and resentment among the Palestinian population and in the wider Arab world and undercuts moderates who wish to pursue peace."
[46] Time Mideast correspondent Scott MacLeod wrote in the
Los Angeles Times that Israeli policy cannot be shielded from a group like Human Rights Watch.
In a November 2012
The Wall Street Journal article, David Feith said that there has been "bitter debate" within HRW about whether Iran's alleged
call for annihilation of Israel is a violation of human rights. HRW vice-chair Sid Sheinberg wrote in an internal email that doing nothing while
Ahmadinejad wants to "kill Jews and annihilate Israel ... is a position unworthy of our great organization." According to Kenneth Roth, "
Tehran isn't inciting genocide and claims to the contrary are part of an effort to beat the war drums against Iran."
In an analysis published by the
Jewish Telegraphic Agency,
Ron Kampeas criticized HRW reports: "Reconstructions of the horrific death of civilians replete with painstakingly gathered evidence are coupled with bewildering omissions of context and blended into a package that assumes an inherent Israeli immorality" and denounced "efforts to turn criticism of individual officers and soldiers into a wholesale indictment of Israel's military establishment and the decision to resort to military force." According to Kampeas, HRW reports on the 2009 fighting in Gaza "fail to assess evidence — including videos of Israeli forces holding their fire because of the presence of civilians — that Israel has provided to show that such incidents were the exception to the rule; they fail to examine what measures Israel has taken to prevent civilian deaths, which would be pertinent in examining any claim of war crimes."
In October 2009, Robert Bernstein criticized the organization's policy in the Middle East in a
New York Times op-ed. According to Bernstein, "With increasing frequency, [HRW] casts aside its important distinction between open and closed societies ... The region is populated by authoritarian regimes with appalling human rights records. Yet in recent years Human Rights Watch has written far more condemnations of Israel for violations of international law than of any other country in the region." HRW London branch director Tom Porteus replied that the organization rejected Bernstein's "obvious double standard. Any credible human rights organization must apply the same human rights standards to all countries." Jane Olson and Jonathan Fanton wrote in a letter to
The New York Times, "We were saddened to see Robert L. Bernstein argue that Israel should be judged by a different human rights standard than the rest of the world ... As long as open societies commit human rights abuses, Human Rights Watch has a vital role to play in documenting those violations and advocating to bring them to an end." According to the organization, in April 2009 Bernstein brought his concerns to the HRW board of directors; the board unanimously rejected his view that Human Rights Watch should report only on closed societies, expressing its full support for the organization's work.
The New Republic published a lengthy article about HRW in April 2010, criticizing the organization for "giving disproportionate attention to Israeli misdeeds." "Robert James—a businessman, World War II veteran, and member of the MENA [Middle East and North Africa Desk of HRW] advisory committee who has been involved with HRW almost since its inception—calls the group 'the greatest NGO since the Red Cross'," but argues that it is chronically incapable of introspection. 'Bob [Bernstein, founder and former chair of HRW] is bringing this issue up on Israel', he says. 'But Human Rights Watch has a more basic problem ... They cannot take criticism'." According to the magazine (referring to Bernstein's
The New York Times op-ed), "Yet, as difficult as it was to go public, Bernstein does not believe that Human Rights Watch left him with much choice. 'They think they've heard me out,' he says. 'You see, they think they've listened to me until they can't listen anymore. Actually, they haven't listened at all'." In November 2010 Bernstein delivered the Shirley and Leonard Goldstein Lecture on Human Rights at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, accusing HRW of "fault[ing] Israel as the principal offender" in the Israel-Palestine conflict and suggesting that human-rights groups were responsible for polarizing university campuses.
In her
The Washington Post blog,
Jennifer Rubin described HRW as "an anti-Israel group masquerading as one devoted to human rights". Orlando Radice said about his interview with Kenneth Roth for
The Jewish Chronicle, "This was less of an interview than an exercise in denial, obfuscation and plain old censorship."
In an email on her last day at HRW, Danielle Haas, a departing senior editor, accused the organization of politicizing its work on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. She expressed concern about HRW's responses to the
Hamas massacres in Israel on October 7, stating that "years of institutional creep culminated in organizational responses that shattered professionalism, abandoned principles of accuracy and fairness, and surrendered its duty to stand for the human rights of all."
Garlasco incident
Senior HRW investigator
Marc Garlasco has been criticized for collecting Nazi memorabilia, and Emma Daly confirmed without elaboration in March 2010 that Garlasco had resigned from Human Rights Watch the previous month. Garlasco, who wrote a book about
Nazi-era medals, posted on a collector website: "That is so
cool! The leather
SS jacket makes my blood go cold it is so COOL!"
Ron Dermer, then
Benjamin Netanyahu's policy director, said about Garlasco: "A war crimes investigator who is an avid collector and trader in Nazi memorabilia is perhaps a new low." HRW issued a rebuttal, saying that the "accusation is demonstrably false and fits into a campaign to deflect attention from Human Rights Watch's rigorous and detailed reporting on violations of international human rights and humanitarian law by the Israeli government" and Garlasco "has never held or expressed Nazi or anti-Semitic views."
Helena Cobban (a fellow analyst on the Human Rights Watch Middle East advisory board) said that Garlasco engaged with "people who clearly do seem to be Nazi sympathizers," which she called "extremely disturbing".
According to the organization Garlasco "covered Iraq as a senior intelligence analyst at the Pentagon", and
The Guardian reported that he served in this role for seven years. He was chief of high-value targeting during the Iraq war in 2003, on the Operation Desert Fox (Iraq) Battle Damage Assessment team in 1998 and led a Pentagon Battle Damage Assessment team to Kosovo in 1999. Garlasco also participated in over 50 interrogations as a subject-matter expert.
In a piece for
The National, Alan Philps wrote that "the Netanyahu government and its supporters have set out to destroy the credibility of the UN Human Rights Council and all non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working in the human rights field ... The aim is clearly to de-legitimize the organization at a time when its rights-based analysis coincides with some of the views of the US president Barack Obama."
According to
Christian Science Monitor staff writer Robert Marquand, a U.N. report by "jurist Richard Goldstone, head of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, chief prosecutor for the Yugoslav war-crimes tribunal" showed illegal white-phosphorus use consistent with Garlasco's eyewitness testimony provided to the
Monitor. Marquand wrote that it was "not okay ... to use Garlasco to distract from or obfuscate findings that war crimes and crimes against humanity may have taken place in Gaza".
Shawan Jabarin appointment
In February 2011, HRW appointed
Shawan Jabarin to their Mideast Advisory Board. Jabarin has been called "
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" by the Israeli
Supreme Court for his roles in the militant
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the human-rights organization
Al Haq. HRW's decision to include Jabarin on its Mideast Board evoked criticism.
[77]
I didn't realize I was only allowed to show violent intent from only one side. Anything hyperbolic coming from the Israeli side is not allowed.
www.jpost.com
apnews.com
blogs.timesofisrael.com
www.yahoo.com
