Obsession and Scandals: HRW in 2009

NGO Monitor
January 05, 2010

Summary:
Human Rights Watch publications on “Israel and the OPT” comprised 28 percent of its total Mideast output in 2009. Israel received more attention than Iran, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Syria, and other chronic human rights abusers.[1]

HRW allocated a disproportionate amount of resources to promoting the UN “fact-finding” mission of former board member Richard Goldstone, including statements in support of UN resolutions that condemned Israel. The 34 pro-Goldstone publications out-numbered documents on all the countries in the Middle East, except Israel and Iran.

Scandals included a fundraising trip to Saudi Arabia, which used HRW’s anti-Israel bias and the specter of the pro-Israel lobby to solicit funds from “prominent members of Saudi society.”

The revelation that Marc Garlasco, “senior military analyst,” is an avid collector of Nazi memorabilia casts serious doubt on HRW’s credibility and demands a close reexamination of his work for the organization.

In a New York Times op-ed, HRW founder Robert Bernstein strongly criticized the organization for its anti-Israel bias and for ignoring severe human rights violations in closed societies.

HRW has taken no action to implement Bernstein’s call to “resurrect itself as a moral force in the Middle East,” or the call from NGO Monitor’s International Advisory Board (including Elie Wiesel and Alan Dershowitz) to “institute a full independent review and reform in the organization.”

In every instance of scandal and criticism, HRW officials (Roth, Levine, Whitson, etc.) responded with ad hominem attacks and ignored the substance.

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