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'Amnesty Israel must resign'

NGO watchdog calls on Amnesty International's Israel branch to quit global organization

A soon to be released report by Amnesty International (AI) on Israel is so prejudiced that the human rights group's Israeli branch must quit the organization, an NGO Watchdog said in a statement Sunday.

 

NGO Monitor, based in Jerusalem, and headed by Professor Gerald Steinberg, said that the Israeli branch's participation "in this campaign undermines the basis of universal human rights."

 

It described Amnesty's report, "Enduring Occupation: Palestinians under siege in the West Bank," as providing "more evidence of AI's strong political agenda on Arab-Israeli issues," adding that "this report also reinforces the unjustified boycott campaigns that delegitimize Israel and the right of self-defense."

 

"The emotive language employed in the report is more appropriate for a propaganda communiqué, such as the highly charged opening implication that Israel deliberately kills Palestinian children. Once again, Amnesty has invented and ignored evidence in order to demonize Israel," NGO Monitor charged.

 

'This report is not anti-Israel'

The NGO watchdog added that "the report also falsely implies that Israel arbitrarily imposes restrictions on Palestinians, commits 'war crimes,' and calls for Israelis to be prosecuted in the world's courts. AI's report barely acknowledges Palestinian terror and the extensive support it receives from neighboring regimes. Nor is there substantial recognition of Israel's right, according to international law, to defend itself against such terror."

 

Responding to the charges, Amnesty International's Israel branch Director-General, Amnon Vidan, said his office "stood fully behind the report," and dismissed the call to leave global Amnesty International.

 

"This is a report that sums up the main violations in the territories; it will highlight 40 years of Israeli military occupation," Vidan told Ynetnews. "This report is not anti-Israel, but sums up things that Amnesty has been claiming for years, regarding the influence of this occupation on Palestinians lives. Its standards and methodologies are what guides AI around the world. And therefore the claim that the report is anti-Israel is demagoguery," he added.

 

"The call for us to disengage from Amnesty is irrelevant, because we are one organization," Vidan said. "We stand behind the same principles of human rights, supported by all Amnesty members around the world, including those in Israel. And we fully stand behind Amnesty's report," he added.

 


פרסום ראשון: 06.04.07, 00:00
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