NGO Monitor

Institute for Contemporary Affairs
founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation

www.ngo-monitor.org

October 22, 2006:

Response to Aryeh Neier, New York Review of Books
"The Attack on Human Rights Watch"
Volume 53, Number 17 · November 2, 2006

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19500

Editor,

The debate between Human Right Watch and its critics, as reflected in Aryeh Neier's contribution, illustrates the importance of looking beyond the halo protecting powerful NGO officials from transparency and accountability. To this end, NGO Monitor provides systematic analyses of the activities of numerous NGOs, including HRW.[1] The need for this was highlighted by the NGO Forum at the 2001 Durban Conference on Racism, which adopted a strategy of exploiting the rhetoric of human rights to demonize Israel as a sovereign state. (HRW's delegation, headed by Reed Brody, participated actively.)[2]

A detailed analysis of all of HRW's activities related to Israel, and in comparison with other countries around the world, is beyond the scope of this letter. But a few examples provide evidence of HRW's double standards and carelessness with respect to facts and law, including reliance on hearsay and filling holes in the record with assumptions of malevolence and guilt.

In the recent Lebanon War, the issue is not, as Neier claims, whether all of Israel's actions were justified – but whether HRW was justified in calling them all indefensible. According to Executive Director Kenneth Roth, "Human Rights Watch investigated some two dozen bombing incidents in Lebanon. In none of those cases was Hezbullah anywhere around at the time of the attack."[3] These claims, which were widely contradicted in reports published by the New York Times and elsewhere, came from "eye witnesses" in Hezbollah-dominated South Lebanon. On this dubious basis, HRW published almost daily accusations of Israeli "war crimes" and "indiscriminate attacks".[4] In other words, HRW's record is far from Neier's portrayal of "careful, objective investigations".

HRW has refused to provide information on how it sets in agenda for major reports, lobbying campaigns, and other activities. However, the record speaks for itself. NGO Monitor's detailed study found that in 2004, HRW publications dealing with the Middle East and North Africa – from Morocco to Iran – placed far more emphasis on allegations against Israel; in comparison to such human rights stalwarts as Libya, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran, the Palestinian Authority, and even Sudan.[5] Neier cites HRW’s simple-minded count of publications, mixing one page emails with hundred page reports accompanied by full-scale press campaigns and opeds. In contrast, NGO Monitor uses a weighted approach, and the HRW publications, including those subsequently removed from the internet, are available for verification.

Timing in the human rights business, as elsewhere, is everything. NGO Monitor has found that occasional HRW reports on war crimes committed against Israel usually come much later, as in the case of Hezbollah, and are quickly forgotten, even by HRW's officials. Neier cites HRW research on Palestinian suicide bombers published in November 2002, almost seven years after the first wave of such attacks. And this very late effort did not diminish HRW's blanket condemnations of legitimate Israeli defensive actions, including the security barrier that has saved hundreds of lives. This report, like other examples taken out of context, provides the illusion of universal standards, but not the substance.

Rejecting the substantive claims, Neier attributes criticism of HRW to an atmosphere that prevents "rational discussion …of Israel's policies and practices". To the degree that emotional factors are involved, it is Roth and his colleagues at HRW who are responsible. In an angry response to Dr. Avi Bell's criticism of HRW's campaigns during the Lebanon war, first published in NGO Monitor, Roth referred to Israeli policy as an "eye for an eye", ignorantly and pejoratively calling this the "morality of some more primitive moment".[6] In his version, Neier deleted the phrase, tacitly acknowledging its offensive nature.

The exploitation of human rights to promote political agendas has disfigured human rights norms beyond recognition, and Prof. Kenneth Anderson (a former HRW official) has warned of the "spiral toward more and more extreme views".[7] Those who claim to promote human rights should be leading the effort to restore the universality and credibility of these norms.

Gerald M. Steinberg
Editor, NGO Monitor
Jerusalem, Israel

Footnotes:

2. Anne Bayefsky, "Human Rights Watch Coverup," Jerusalem Post, April 13, 2004. "HRW Response on Durban and Exchange with NGO Monitor," April 25, 2004.

3. Kenneth Roth, "Indiscriminate bombardment," Jerusalem Post, August 17, 2006.

4. NGO Monitor, "NGOs in the Lebanon War-Update," September 10, 2006.

5. NGO Monitor, "A Comparative Analysis of Activities in the Middle East, Revised," June 30, 2005 (PDF); Joshua Muravchik, Human Rights Watch vs. Human Rights, The Weekly Standard, September 11, 2006

6. Kenneth Roth, Letter in Response to Avi Bell's "Getting in Straight", New York Sun, July 31, 2006.

7. Kenneth Anderson, "Questions re Human Rights Watch's credibility in Lebanon reporting", August 23, 2006.