Amnesty’s Israel chief criticizes group’s report accusing Israel of apartheid
Executive director of Amnesty Israel Molly Malekar
Tani Goldstein reports in The Times of Israel:
The executive director of Amnesty International Israel has sharply criticized the umbrella international organization over its report earlier this month that accused Israel of practicing apartheid against the Palestinians, saying the document is not helping the situation, and may even be making things worse.
In an interview with Zman Yisrael, The Times of Israel’s Hebrew-language sister site, Molly Malekar aired her grievances over the report, which was rejected by Israel and has also divided her own organization.
She described the accusation that Israel engages in apartheid, as well as other elements of the Amnesty report, as a “punch to the gut.” According to Malekar, many others who campaign for Palestinian rights, both in Israel and in the West Bank, feel the same way.
Amnesty’s report, released February 1 at a press conference in Jerusalem’s Bab A-Zahara neighborhood, found that Israel applies a form of apartheid against Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and around the world, and, most significantly and controversially, against Arab Israelis.
Malekar said that what bothered her most was not the claim that Israel engages in apartheid according to international law, about which, she said, there is a “serious debate.” Rather, she said, Amnesty, as an organization whose goal is to promote human rights, shouldn’t be concerning itself with theoretical definitions.
When Amnesty publishes a paper, “the only important question is what are you trying to achieve by it,” she said. Malekar said she had stressed to Amnesty administrators and branches in other countries that within Israel there was a struggle between “nationalist forces and humanitarian forces.”