The European Commission has restored funding to the Palestinian human rights groups Al-Haq despite an Israeli attack on it and five other Palestinian human rights and civil society organizations as having supposed terrorist links. “They can do anything they want. They can confiscate [our laptops and files]; they can close the office; they can arrest people; they can arrest me and criminalize me,” Shawan Jabarin of Al-Haq says. “We will not give up. I assure you we will not give up, and we will not step back.”

Surely a surprise to Israeli PM Bennett — the American Bar Association sent him a letter challenging the country’s designation of six Palestinian human rights groups as terrorist organizations. “We request that you review the concerns some in the international community have expressed questioning whether the procedures utilized [in making this designation] inappropriately deprive persons or organizations of their rights,” the ABA president wrote. His letter also calls attention to Israel’s biased court system. The ABA has thus added another respected voice to the growing criticism of Israel’s apartheid laws, policies and practices and, by extension, to the silence of the U.S. State Department on this matter. 

Israeli forces have killed five Palestinians over the past week, and 17 Palestinians since the start of 2022. Of the 17 Palestinians killed, three were children.

Sahar Francis, the General Director of the Ramallah-based group Addameer, warns that the Israeli government’s efforts to undermine Palestinian civil society organizations may just be beginning.

Caging Childhood: Palestinian Children in Israel’s Military Detention System is a short documentary that tells the story of three Palestinian children who were detained by the Israeli military in the West Bank.

More than 100 global foundations and donors, most of them U.S.-based, have signed on to an open letter expressing solidarity with Palestinian civil society after six leading human rights organizations were designated as so-called “terrorist organizations” by the Israeli military: “”As global funders of human rights and democracy, this attempt to ‘chill’ our funding and solidarity will not work. We stand with Palestinian civil society organizations and human rights defenders.”

“This is state terrorism at its finest hour,” Ubai Al-Aboudi, head of one of the Palestinian human rights organizations Israel has labeled terrorist groups, tells a Washington, DC, webinar convened by leading American thinktanks to push back against the secret dossiers Israel has circulated. He and other Palestinian execs say they crossed Israel’s red line when they assisted the ICC investigation of Israeli war crimes and assisted Rep. McCollum’s bill to cut off U.S. funds for Israeli mistreatment of Palestinian children.

For much of this year, Israel’s defenders have waged a successful battle to keep the word “apartheid” from entering the mainstream discourse. Israel just set that process back by smearing Palestinian human rights groups as terrorist organizations.

In Israel’s latest attack on Palestinian civil society organizations, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz announced a list of six Palestinian human rights organizations which he claimed have links to militant “terror” groups. On the list were prominent institutions like Addameer, Al-Haq, and Defense for Children International – Palestine.

Israel has stopped arguing for years the actual content of human rights reports or allegations directed at its conduct. Instead, Israel’s strategy is to simply attack human rights organizations themselves.