HRW's Ken Roth shills for Hamas. Again.

He might occasionally grudgingly admit that Hamas rockets aren't exactly wonderful, but for any area where one can argue to be stricter or less strict on human rights, Ken Roth of Human Rights Watch always chooses the anti-Israel side.

Here's something he tweeted yesterday:

Tunnels used to attack or capture civilians is a rights violation. Tunnels used to attack or capture soldiers isn't. http://t.co/gPPScdrYDO
— Kenneth Roth (@KenRoth) July 29, 2014

Well, Islamic Jihad's legal team might agree that tunnelling into the territory of a sovereign state to kidnap a soldier and hold him hostage is fine, but it isn't true.

I don't need to quote the IDF on this, either. Even B'Tselem calls it a war crime:

On the one-year anniversary of the abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories , states that he must be released immediately. The organization says that the circumstances of his capture and the behavior of his captors clearly indicate that he is a hostage.

International humanitarian law absolutely prohibits taking and holding a person by force in order to compel the enemy to meet certain demands, while threatening to harm or kill the person if the demands are not met. Furthermore, hostage-taking is considered a war crime and all those involved bear individual criminal liability.

Hamas, which de-facto controls the security apparatus in the Gaza Strip, bears the responsibility to act to release Shalit immediately and unconditionally. Until he is released, those holding him must grant him humane treatment and allow representatives of the ICRC to visit him. The fact that Shalit's right to these visits has been denied constitutes a blatant violation of international law, says B'Tselem.

Shalit was a soldier, wasn't he?

How does the Fourth Geneva Convention word the prohibition of taking hostages?

The taking of hostages is prohibited.

That is the entire Article 34.

No mention of "civilians" or anything. No exception for soldiers. A flat out, explicit prohibition. (Yes, soldiers are covered in Article 4 of the same Convention.)

This isn't the first time Roth defines examples of international law in an artificially - and incorrectly - narrow way in order to exonerate Israel's enemies. But it sure does establish a pattern.

And that pattern is always against the human rights of Israelis.

(h/t @neontaster)