A controversy that the rightwing lobby is seeking to stir up over the fact that Human Rights Watch has raised money recently in Saudi Arabia is well-reported here by Ali Gharib:
[Law professor/blogger David] Bernstein maintained that "it's extremely unwise for a human rights group to raise money in a totalitarian country, even from human rights advocates in that country."
[HRW's Sarah Leah] Whitson said the claim had no grounds, noting that the notion "that any money from Saudi Arabia is tainted because it comes from a country with a totalitarian ruling regime is a gross generalisation."
"The ethnic background of our donors is irrelevant to the work we do," Whitson told IPS. "It's not relevant to our work in Israel that many, many of our donors are Jewish. And it's not relevant for the work that we do that we get money from Arab countries."
"Should people be criticising us for the fact that much of our support base is made up of Jews?" Whitson said. "Should that imply that our work on Israel is in fact too soft?"
Good questions. Ethnicity can be predictive, actually. But not always. This is the central struggle of this site.
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News item of interest, on Yahoo. Nice: BOSTON – A Massachusetts philanthropist who lost most of his personal fortune in the Bernard Madoff scandal has paid $5 million out of his own pocket to restore the retirement savings of employees who lost money in the multibillion dollar scam. Ronald I. Lappin on Wednesday made up for the lost savings of the 60 employees of his company, Shetland Properties Inc., and of his charity, the Robert I. Lappin Charitable Foundation, whose 401(k) plans were managed by Madoff. The foundation, which sends Jewish youths to Israel, closed briefly when it lost $8 million in Madoff's Ponzi scheme. Lappin tells The Boston Globe he just wanted to do the right thing. Lappin says his net worth is less than $10 million, a 10th of what it was before the scandal.
"Ethnicity can be predictive, actually. But not always. This is the central struggle of this site." Hey Phil & Adam, we got your back. Progressive Jewish Americans need to lead the charge, and the gentiles will follow.
"Should people be criticising us for the fact that much of our support base is made up of Jews?" Whitson said. "Should that imply that our work on Israel is in fact too soft?" She sort of changes the subject, and makes a category error in the process. HRW doesn't do reports on ethnic or religous groups but on countries. The question being asked is whether she can raise money among Saudi Arabia's elite — whose fortunes and influence are closely tied to its ruling class through family and business networks — and remain unbiased. By dragging the "Jews" into this, she is dissolving the distinction between American citizens who happen to be Jewish and Israeli citizens who happen to be Jews. And I'm willing to bet that the degree to which an American Jew gives to human rights watch is inversely disproportional to his/her support for right-wing policies and activities in Israel. But that wasn't even the most important question being asked, by Jeffrey Goldberg and others. The question was, Is it proper to raise money from one group by boasting about the tough way you treat another?
The better analogy — Would they raise money among Chinese foundations by pointing to their tough report on Taiwan? That might suggest to an outsider that HRW would be willing to game its findings to please its biggest donors. Now, that may not be true, and probably isn't, but by making a sales pitch to the Saudis onthe basis of their tough take on Israel, it certainly creates the appearance. And you don't have to be right wing or left to appreciate the wrong-headedness of such a move.
And finally, Phil, how would you react if a Palestinian news service reported that HRW was fundaising among wealthy Israelis and boasting how tough they were on Hamas, the P.A., and Iran? Are you trying to tell me you wouldn't find that objectionable?
I meant to post this under your earlier comment, so I will repost it under your current one. You haven't read the article. It gives a whole new perspective on how baseless the criticism is. You are taking the WSJ piece at a face value it clearly doesn't deserve. Please read the article linked by Ali Gharib ( in Phil's post above). You are taking the criticism from Bernstein and Goldberg at face value, while the article clearly points out that the allegations against HRW are not backed up by the email excerpts and prior news articles that they cite. Whitson makes clear that there was much interest at the Saudi citizen attended dinner in human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia. By citing the wording of the email excerpts and Arab new article themselves versus what Goldberg and Bernstein claimed was said in those emails and article, he effective puts the lie to much if not all of their criticism.
What percentage of Gentiles did he have in his company and in his NGO? Is he doing more than just righting Madoff's Jewish wrong (taking advantage of fellow Jews), or doing something even more morally heroic, that is, righting the wrong impacting all humans in his organizations and their beneficiaries to the extent he can?
We'd like to help lead, but we realize it would handicap the progressive process since no one will listen to us unless we have Jewish backup; instead, the progress will stall on the banks of frivolous anti-semitism charges. That's what the wealthy and connected zealot 2% of the population of the population can do with the other 98% of less ethnocentric peoples.
I think what he did was highly honorable, irrespective of the backgrounds of his employees.
HRW has no moral compass. Like this website, the rules apply for Jews, not Arabs.
This was a Dailykos diary a few days back. The usual pettifoggery about tyrants and the mistreatment of women. Because Israel is so concerned for these things.
Bah, Robbespierre was a stern moralist. Augustus Caeser was so moral the Romans made him a god. Hitler, moralist. The latest President-watch-me-pray-rube sure loved him some morals.
"However, of more than 30 releases in June and July from its Middle East and North Africa division, HRW was critical of Israel in only three of them, whereas Saudi Arabia was criticised five times, and Israel's regional archrival, Iran, racked up nine critical releases. " Please shut up until you know what you are talking about, which i fear may be never.
You guys always say. Black is white, Jew is Nazi, Hitler is Moral, Palestinians are victims. Throw enough kerfluffle in the air and maybe someone will buy it? Not I
HRW is biased against Israel as are many NGO
Obviously, the Jewish plutocracy prefers that human rights organizations be dependent on Jewish largess. Historically, it has cultivated African-American leaders willing to sit up, to beg, and to do tricks on Jewish command. Gloria White-Hammond in Boston is an example of a tame Jew-pandering Jew-blessed African-American shabbesshikse: Hub of the World (Zionist Conspiracy).
Off-topic, slightly related to HRW: I'm sure many of you have seen this story about Russian human rights activist Natalia Estemirova of the organization Memorial, who was kidnapped from her home in Grozny, Chechenia ("Chechnya") yesterday and driven to neighboring Ingushetia, where she was shot twice in the head and dumped near the side of the road. Ms. Estemirova also worked closely with Human Rights Watch to document Russian human rights violations in Chechenia, and an HRW tribute to her work can be found here. The Boston Globe printed a fairly good article about her murder as well. Ms. Estemirova is simply the most recent in a long line of brave human rights workers and journalists who have taken their lives into their hands, and subsequently lost them, by venturing into the Caucasus to capture on film and in print Russia's numerous war crimes and human rights violations against the peoples of that region, especially Chechenia. I, for one, stand with Natalia's comrade in Memorial, Oleg Orlov, when he asserts, "I know, I am sure of it, who is guilty for the murder of Natalia … His name is Ramzan Kadyrov [current President of the puppet Chechen government]". I long for the day when Kadyrov, Medvedev, and Putin get what's coming to them.
HRW and many NGO's are against Zimbabwe, China and other human rights abusing countries too. Israel is not alone.
Israel is singled out by HRW. The org is biased
But it's not. Israel is among a number of human rights abusing countries that it reports on. It's Israel's fault that it abuses human rights. No point blaming HRW for noticing.
Who said Black is white, Jew is Nazi, Hitler is Moral? It's a fact that the Palestinians are victims. Who cares if you're not buying it,. The rest of the world is.
Just repeating a falsehood over and over used to work. Mark Regev smeared HRW on British TV regarding the soldiers 'Breaking the silence'. Pretty typical; a PR man criticising an honest soldier who believes his actions were unacceptable. Straight out of Dan Gillerman's office.
Honest soldier? No names, no actual verifiable events.
Don't speak bad about Dan Gillerman. You don't know him, you never met him and he is a Hero. Palestinian UN delegate liked Dan, everybody liked Dan. But hey, He is a Jew and he fights for Israel so you knock down his character.
Poor "Palestinean victims" murdered a dozen athletes at the Munich Olympics. And hijacked and bombed airliners for a couple of decades. And murdered American soldiers like Robert Stethem. And blew up the Marines barracks in Lebanon, killing 250 Marines. And terrorized and continue to terrorize innocent civilians in dozens of countries to this day. Victims, my foot!
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