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What's On Our Mind ...
Amnesty International (AI), an organization that feigns commitment to protecting all human rights around the world, used its international platform to once again delegitimize Israel and spread bias against Israel throughout the world.
Their report this week, the 208th report on Israel since the 1970s, unevenly criticized Israel for human rights violations while failing to condemn Hamas and other terror groups.
Meanwhile, AI has issued only 40 reports on North Korea, a country well-known for its significant and documented human rights violations. Some of those include: arbitrary killings by the government and unjustified arrests, as well as prosecutions against journalists.
AI claims to “campaign for a world where human rights are enjoyed by all.” Yet if they really looked at Israel they’d see a country where Israeli Arabs have the same rights as any other Israeli citizen and a country where Arab women can vote.
This week the Israeli Judicial Selection Committee appointed six Arab judges and jurists to prominent positions in district courts across the country, half of whom were women.
AI ignored these undisputed facts and created a further flashpoint for violence. As Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the ADL said, “unhinged rhetoric leads to unhinged action.”
There is already fear that this report will lead to a spike in violence against Jewish communities worldwide, increased BDS campaigns, and an excuse for more antisemitism on college campuses.
Many JAC friends including Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), Brad Schneider (D-IL), Lois Frankel (D-FL), Elaine Luria (D-VA), Kathy Manning (D-NC), and Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) signed a bipartisan letter condemning the report saying it is “steeped in antisemitism” and is part of AI’s “decades-long campaign to criminalize and delegitimize the world’s only Jewish state.”
Israel, like the U.S., is not without flaws. More can be done to improve the lives of the Palestinians and to ultimately reach a peace agreement. But AI’s report did not advance those goals, rather it just served as a distraction from the real work with potentially dangerous consequences.
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