Human Rights Watch hires Israel-basher

Thanks to the excellent NGO Monitor organization.

Ken Roth and Human Rights Watch have employed Lucy Mair as a researcher in Israel/Occupied Territories. Ms. Mair's qualifications include writing for the "Electronic Intifada" and work with Grassroots International, a radical pro-Palestinian political organization. (Since HRW's employment process is secret, and not subject to independent review, we are unable to compare her credentials and expertise on universal human rights issues with the other candidates.) Her descriptions of Life in Palestine, and articles for "Palestine Now" etc., focus exclusively on Palestinian "fear and the loss and the humiliation and the despair", with no mention of terror, suicide bombings, and the human rights of Israelis. References to Israeli soldiers "protected by arrogance and hatred" are hostile stereotypes, and she echoes the false massacre claims in referring to Palestinians "killed in their homes in Jenin when the tanks and the bulldozers ate up their camp". In this extreme biased approach to Israel that extends far beyond legitimate criticism, she joins the other members of HRW's Middle East team, including Sarah Leah Whitson (from MADRE) and Joe Stork (from MERIP).

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Thus, HRW has hired someone whose experience in 'human rights' is based upon a history of promoting the Palestinian cause with absolutely no regard for the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the rights of Israelis to defend themselves from Palestinian terror. Kenneth Roth has once again demonstrated his policy of filling HRW's Middle East department with like-minded politicized individuals whose priorities are not in keeping with the promotion of universal human rights values.