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aryeh neier
Genocide Prevention Group Says 'Israel Must Be Stopped Now'
"Even if there were legitimate doubts about Israel's genocide, there is no doubt that Israel is committing atrocity crimes of the most barbaric kind," the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention said.
May 28, 2024
A U.S.-based group dedicated to preventing genocide blasted what it called "the cynical lies and propaganda" from Israeli and U.S. leaders who deny that Israel's obliteration of Gaza is genocidal, while imploring humanity to stop the slaughter.
In a statement published Monday on social media, the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention (LIGP) argued that "one can have different views about the definition of genocide, but one may not use definitional disputes to deny genocide."
"If a genocide may be occurring, every nation is compelled by customary law to try to stop it," asserted the Philadelphia-based group named after Raphael Lemkin, the 20th-century Polish lawyer who is credited with coining the word genocide in the 1940s.
"Let us be clear: Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. The U.S. is complicit in genocide," LIGP said. "These are not political statements. They are statements that are made from knowledge and experience."
"Nevertheless, you do not need a Ph.D. , a law degree, or X-ray vision to see the genocidal dimensions of Israel's carnage in Gaza. It is clear in the behavior of the state and its military, on full display in yesterday's horrific bombardment of a Rafah camp," the group added, referring to the attack on a refugee encampment in the southern city's Tal al-Sultan neighborhood that killed at least 45 people and wounded hundreds of others, including many women and children.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the strike a "tragic mistake." Two days later, at least 21 more Palestinians were killed in another Israel Defense Forces attack on a different refugee camp in southern Gaza.
LIGP said that "even if there were legitimate doubts about Israel's genocide, there is no doubt that Israel is committing atrocity crimes of the most barbaric kind."
"Israel must be stopped," the group stressed. "Israel must be stopped now."
LIGP continued:
We are disgusted by Western leaders, especially in the USA, Germany, and the U.K. They have demonstrated not only that they don't care one bit about genocide prevention and human rights, but also that they are willing to allow an ally to commit atrocity crimes while they offer material and diplomatic support. It is reprehensible and the individuals involved in this gaslighting campaign should be deeply ashamed. They should also be put on trial.
International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan last week formally applied for warrants to arrest Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders for alleged crimes including extermination committed on and after October 7.
Israeli and U.S. leaders deny there is genocide in Gaza. U.S. President Joe Biden said in October that he had "no confidence" in Palestinian health officials' Gaza casualty reports—figures deemed reliable by United Nations agencies, human rights groups, international and Israeli mainstream media, and even the U.S. State Department.
Biden, who early in the war declared his "unwavering" support for Israel, has approved billions of dollars of new U.S. military aid for the key Middle Eastern ally. His administration has repeatedly sidestepped Congress to expedite weapons transfers to Israel. The U.S. has also provided diplomatic cover for Netanyahu's far-right government by vetoing several United Nations Security Council cease-fire resolutions.
The International Court of Justice is currently determining whether Israel is committing genocide, as alleged by South Africa and over 30 countries and regional blocs supporting the case. The ICJ recently ordered Israel to immediately halt its invasion of Rafah. Israel has ignored the legally binding order, prompting calls for punitive action including sanctions.
According to Palestinian officials and international human rights defenders, at least 36,096 Palestinians—mostly women and children—have been killed during Israel's 235-day assault on Gaza in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack that left more than 1,100 people dead and over 240 others taken prisoner. At least 81,136 Palestinians have been wounded by Israeli bombs and bullets. Upward of 11,000 other Gazans are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of bombed-out buildings.
Meanwhile, famine in the north and widespread starvation throughout Gaza have been exacerbated by Israel's blockade of the besieged coastal enclave, where around 90% of the population have been forcibly displaced.
"Humanity has a choice: Either we decide that our children can all be killed whenever a superior force alleges that 'terrorists' are among us, or we decide that under no circumstances will we allow these superior forces to lay waste to our world any longer," LIGP said. "We each must choose and act accordingly. The watershed moment is now."
At least hundreds of legal and human rights experts around the world—including Israelis—accuse Israel of genocide. In March, the United Nations Human Rights Council published a draft report that found "reasonable grounds to believe" that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
On Sunday, Human Rights Watch co-founder Aryeh Neier—a Jewish Holocaust survivor—reiterated his earlier assertion that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. In an interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria, Neier explained how his assessment of Israel's conduct has evolved during the war.
"I thought Israel had a right to retaliate against Hamas, and I thought Israel had a right to try to incapacitate Hamas so that it would never be able to do anything like that again," Neier said. "But I was disturbed by some of the actions of Israel, by the use of very large weapons, 2,000-pound bombs, which are utterly inappropriate in a crowded urban area."
Is Israel committing humanitarian crimes in Gaza? The Israeli gov’t strenuously denies it.
Aryeh Neier, a giant in the world of human rights who escaped Nazi Germany and later cofounder Human Rights Watch, says the answer is yes.
Our conversation from today’s GPS: pic.twitter.com/dQC20WDywO
— Fareed Zakaria (@FareedZakaria) May 26, 2024
Neier also condemned Israeli and U.S. officials' efforts to equate criticism of Israel's policies and practices with antisemitism.
"Antisemitism has been a great scourge," he said, "but it doesn't insulate the Israeli government from being held to the same standards as other governments have to be held to around the world."
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Veteran Human Rights Leader Has Seen Enough: Israel Perpetrating Genocide in Gaza
Israel's "sustained policy of obstructing the movement of humanitarian assistance into the territory" pushed Human Rights Watch co-founder Aryeh Neier to view the assault on Gaza as a genocide.
May 14, 2024
A widely respected humanitarian law expert who has resisted using the term "genocide" for Israel's killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza—a word used "sparingly" in the international human rights movement, he noted—said Tuesday that he has concluded a genocide is indeed taking place, evidenced particularly by Israel's blocking of humanitarian aid.
Aryeh Neier, who co-founded Human Rights Watch in 1978, served as its executive director for 12 years, and also led the American Civil Liberties Union and the Open Society Foundations, noted in an essay in The New York Review of Books that his organizations have used the term "genocide" to describe few mass killings.
Neier was not convinced of South Africa's genocide claim against Israel when it argued its case with the International Court of Justice in January, even though he was "deeply distressed" by the human impact of Israel's relentless U.S.-backed bombing campaign in Gaza.
The 2,000-pound bombs being used against Gaza's population of 2.3 million Palestinians were "clearly inappropriate," wrote Neier in the magazine's June 6 issue. "Yet I was not convinced that this constituted genocide."
Neier wrote that he believed at the time that Israel's retaliation against Hamas for the October 7 attack it led in southern Israel could "include an attempt to incapacitate" the Palestinian group, necessitating the wide-scale assault on Gaza, where it operates.
"I am now persuaded that Israel is engaged in genocide against Palestinians in Gaza," wrote Neier, whose family escaped Nazi Germany as refugees when he was an infant. "What has changed my mind is its sustained policy of obstructing the movement of humanitarian assistance into the territory."
Israel's intent to block aid—and to treat Gazans as "collectively complicit for Hamas's crimes"—has been clear since shortly after the October 7 attack, when Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said: "There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we act accordingly."
"I am now persuaded that Israel is engaged in genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. What has changed my mind is its sustained policy of obstructing the movement of humanitarian assistance into the territory."
The result of that policy, wrote Neier, has been the deaths of at least 28 Palestinian children from starvation, according to numbers released by the Gaza Health Ministry in April.
"That number could multiply many times over if reports on food insecurity are valid," he wrote, citing warnings from U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator Samantha Power and World Food Program Executive Director Cindy McCain that famine has already taken hold in parts of Gaza.
Under the "complete siege" ordered by Gallant and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, noted Neier, Israel has severely restricted the number of aid vehicles allowed into Gaza, where the population relied on deliveries from about 500 aid trucks per day before the current escalation. Trucks have been subjected to "time-consuming and onerous inspections," with shipments turned away for including items like children's medical scissors and maternity kits.
Neier also cited Israel's killing of more than 200 aid workers and its persuading of international donors to stop funding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA)—based on unproven allegations that a dozen of its 13,000 Gaza-based staffers had connections to Hamas—as evidence that Israel is taking numerous steps to stop aid from getting to Gaza's starving population, while killing at least 35,173 Palestinians.
Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, said in response to Neier's essay that "no one has more authority among human rights advocates than" the author.
"Aryeh Neier is an immensely respected—and not at all politically radical—figure in the human rights community who can't be credibly accused of having any sort of obsession with Israel," said writer Abe Silberstein.
Neier wrote that after working to protect human rights for more than six decades, "there is much about [Israel's attack on Gaza] that is deeply depressing, including how difficult it is to find a way to give victims any hope that justice will eventually be done."
"I myself hope that the frequent citation of international humanitarian law as the standard for judging the conflict will have a positive effect," he wrote. "Whatever else emerges from this war, and whatever judgment comes from the International Court of Justice (ICJ), it is evident that Israel has done itself as well as its Palestinian victims long-term harm."
The ICJ is currently considering South Africa's claim that Israel is committing genocide, having issued a preliminary ruling in January that the case was "plausible" and that Israel must take steps to prevent genocidal acts.
Although the ICJ does not have jurisdiction to adjudicate war crimes or crimes against humanity charges, wrote Neier, "if it ultimately finds that Israel has committed genocide, that will be a resounding defeat for a state that was born in the aftermath of a genocide that many of its founders had barely survived."
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