B'Tselem

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B'Tselem Logo

B'Tselem (Hebrew: בצלם, "in the image of", as in Genesis 1:27) is an Israeli non-governmental organization (NGO) that describes itself as "The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories". It was founded on February 3, 1989, by a group of Israeli public figures, including lawyers, academics, journalists, and members of the Knesset. B'Tselem's stated goals are "to document and educate the Israeli public and policymakers about human rights violations in the Occupied Territories, combat the phenomenon of denial prevalent among the Israeli public, and help create a human rights culture in Israel".

In December, 1989 the organization received the Carter-Menil Award for Human Rights.

Main activities

The focus on documentation reflects B'Tselem's objective of providing as much information as possible to the Israeli public, since information is indispensable to taking action and making choices. Readers of B'Tselem publications may decide to do nothing, but they cannot say, "We didn't know."

Activity in the Knesset

B'Tselem regularly provides Knesset members with information on human rights violations in the Occupied Territories, and injustices caused by Israeli authorities. Several Knesset members, from various factions, assist B'Tselem in placing human rights matters on the public agenda and in safeguarding human rights.

Public action

B'Tselem has hundreds of supporters and volunteers who work to improve the human rights situation in the Occupied Territories. These activities include, in part, setting up information stands, distributing printed material, addressing problems and requests to decision-makers, and participating in protests in the Occupied Territories.

Reports

The B'Tselem organization publishes reports on various issues such as torture, fatal shootings by security forces, restrictions on movement, expropriation of land and discrimination in planning and building in East Jerusalem, administrative detention, house demolitions, and settler violence. Over one hundred reports have been published so far. The organization serves as a source of information for journalists, researchers and the diplomatic community at the national and international level. B'Tselem's activities receive extensive media coverage.

B'Tselem also campaigns against the death penalty and the human rights record of the Palestinian Authority. On 17 February 2005, the organization called on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to commute the sentences of Palestinians condemned to death and abolish the death penalty. Abbas had shortly before ratified the death sentences of a number of Palestinians accused of collaborating with Israel or of other criminal charges.

Video

B'Tselem has expanded is operations in recent years to increasingly include video based footage, particularly after the highly public "Sharmouta incident". The expansion of its video project began in August 2007 with the launching of MySpace & Facebook sites which are to act as an alternative area for the showcasing of the organisation's films - aimed at expanding the group's presence amongst a younger age category and attracting people to its main website.

Main Research Areas

B'Tselem investigates in a number of areas related to the conflict. In particular the following:

• The accountability of Police & Military forces in the territories.
• The use of administrative punishment.
• The continued use of torture during interrogations, particularly by the GSS.
• The illegal policy of house demolition, as a form of collective punishment which is often justified for alleged military purposes.
• Inequalities in the planning and building procedures which discriminate against Palestinians & Israeli-Arabs.
• The Legal status of residents of East Jerusalem.
• The path and effects of the separation barrier and its legal status.
• Problems related to family unification and child registration.
• Neglect of infrastructure and services.
• Illegal settlements and the extreme closures placed upon the Palestinian population of Hebron.
• Breaches of International human rights law.
• The water crisis in Palestinian areas.
• Family separation.
• Restrictions on movement, such as checkpoints roads, curfew and the effect these have on the economy and medical treatment.
• Settlement land expropriation, settler violence and attacks on Israeli civilians by Palestinians.
• Gaza Strip - The scope of Israeli Control, economic & social decline, supersonic booms, access restrictions, the firing of Qassam rockets.
• Use of force - beating & abuse, use of firearms & human shields.
• Violations by Palestinians - Attacks on civilians, harm to suspected collaborators, death penalty in the Palestinian Authority.
• Workers rights from the territories.

Founding members

B'Tselem's key founders were:

• Dr Daphna Golan-Agnon (academic and founding director of left-leaning feminist peace group Bat Shalom)
• Dedi Zucker (Knesset member for the Ratz party)
• Haim Oron (Knesset member for the Mapam party)
• Zehava Gal-On (Ratz party activist and future Knesset member for the Meretz party formed through the merger of Ratz and Mapam)
• Avigdor Feldman (civil liberties lawyer)
• Dr Edy Kaufman (academic and civil liberties activist)

Board members

B'Tselem board members are:

• Co-chairs:
  • David Kretzmer, Professor of Law, Faculty of Law and School of Public Policy, Hebrew University.
  • Gila Svirsky, Co-founder of Coalition of Women for a Just Peace.

• Neta Amar: Lawyer, Legal Advisor for IHL Project, Diakonia and Staff Attorney for Rabbis for Human Rights.
• Anat Biletzki: Professor of Philosophy, Tel-Aviv University.
• Orna Ben-Naftaly: Head of the Law and Culture Division and the International Law Division, the Law School, the College of Management Academic Studies.
• Menachem Fisch: Professor of the History and Philosophy of Science, Tel-Aviv University and Senior Fellow, Shalom Hartman Institute.
• Tamar Hermann: Dean of Academic Studies, the Open University of Israel, and Senior Research Fellow, the Israel Democracy Institute.
• Amnon Kapeliouk: Journalist, Le Monde Diplomatique.
• Peretz Kidron: Journalist and Translator.
• Menachem Klein: Lecturer in Political Science, Bar Ilan University.
• Victor Lederfarb: Financial Administrator, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel.
• David Neuhaus: Jesuit Priest, Reverend, Lecturer in Religious Studies at Bethlehem University and Seminary of the Holy Land in Beit Jala.
• Danny Rubinstein: Journalist, Ha'aretz Newspaper.
• Alla Shainskaya: Senior Staff Scientist, Weizmann Institute of Science.
• Ronny Talmor: Author and editor.
• Oren Yiftachel: professor of political geography and urban planning, Ben-Gurion University.
• Rayef Zreik: Co-founder of Adalah, The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, Lecturer at the Faculty of Law, Tel-Aviv University.

Board members have changed over the past 10 years. Four board members from 1998 remain on the board in 2008. .

Staff

B'Tselem staff are:

• Jessica Montell, Executive Director

• Research Department
  • Yehezkel Lein, Research Director
  • Anat Barsella, Researcher
  • Ofir Feuerstein, Researcher

• Data Coordination Department
  • Ronen Shimoni, Data Coordination Director
  • Antigona Ashkar, Data Coordinator
  • Suhair Abdi-Habiballah, Statistics Coordinator
  • Maayan Geva, Data Coordinator
  • Noam Preiss, Data Coordinator

• Fieldwork Department
  • Najib Abu Rokaya, Fieldwork Director
  • Musa Abu Hashhash, Field Researcher, Hebron District
  • Atef Abu a-Rub, Field Researcher, Jenin District
  • Khaled 'Azayzeh, Field Researcher, The Gaza Strip
  • Salma Deba'i, Field Researcher, Nablus District
  • Iyad Hadad, Field Researcher, Ramallah District
  • Kareem Issa Jubran, Field Researcher, East Jerusalem
  • 'Abd al-Karim Sa'adi, Field Researcher, Qalqiliya-Tulkarm District
  • Muhammad Sabah, Field Researcher, The Gaza Strip
  • Suha Zeid, Field Researcher, Bethlehem District

• Communications Department
  • Sarit Michaeli, Communications Director
  • Baha Alyan, Arabic Website and Video Editor
  • Shirly Eran, Webmaster
  • Risa Zoll, International Relations Director
  • Lin Chalozin-Dovrat, Campaign Coordinator
  • Diala Shamas, "Shooting back" project coordinator
  • Zvi Shulman, English Translator
  • Oren Yakobovich, Video Coordinator

• Administration Department
  • Ety Dry, Office Manager
  • Ahlam Khatib, Secretary
  • Tamar Gonen, Secretary
  • Micol Nizza, Secretary

Attacks on Staff

B'Tselem staff members have continually come under both verbal and physical attack by both Israeli settlers and military/police. In the past year this has included the slashing of tires on the organisation's jeep and the assault of two of its fieldworker staff. The latest incident of this type occurred on 19th January 2008. According to the organisation "Soldiers assaulted and arrested Issa ‘Amro, a B'Tselem fieldworker...while filming a disturbance by settlers in the Wadi Hsein neighborhood in East Hebron." As this was part of the organsiation's "Shooting Back" project, B'Tselem says it "has several video tapes documenting the incident, which prove that ‘Amro was the one assaulted by the soldiers. The organization is preparing to file complaints to the police on the assault and the false arrest."[3]

Funding

B'Tselem is independent and is funded by contributions from foundations in Europe and North America that support human rights activity worldwide, and by private individuals in Israel and abroad. In 1989, B'Tselem received the $100,000 Carter-Menil Award for Human Rights.

According to B'Tselem, their donors include:

• British Foreign and Commonwealth Office
• Christian Aid (UK)
• Commission of the European Communities
• DanChurchAid (Denmark)
• Diakonia (Sweden)
• Development Corporation Ireland
• EED (Church Development Service, Germany)
• Federal Department of Foreign Affairs of Switzerland
• Ford Foundation (USA)
• Foundation for Middle East Peace
• ICCO (Interchurch Organisation for Development Co-operation, Netherlands)
• International Commission of Jurists, Swedish Section
• Naomi and Nehemiah Cohen Foundation
• New Israel Fund (Israel)
• Norwegian Foreign Ministry
• Shefa Fund
• SIVMO (Netherlands)
• Stichting Het Solidariteitsfonds (Netherlands)
• Trócaire (Ireland)

Criticism and Response

Criticism

NGO Monitor, an Israeli non-governmental organization with the stated aim of monitoring other non-governmental organizations operating in the Middle East, has accused B'Tselem of having a political agenda and falsifying and distorting data. NGO Monitor further writes that B'Tselem also employs "abusive and demonizing rhetoric designed to elicit political support for Palestinians". The Economist and Jewish Telegraphic Agency identify NGO Monitor as a pro-Israel group.

The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA), an American pro-Israel nonprofit organization based in Boston, has voiced concern that B'Tselem classifies casualties into military versus civilian rather than combatant versus non-combatant, though B'Tselem says that they make the distinction using the "civilians not participating in hostilities" classification.

B'Tselem's statistics have also been criticised for defining as "civilian" Palestinians killed while engaged in attacks on Israelis. In response to B'Tselem's 2004 summary of casualties, the Independent Media Review and Analysis (IMRA), an Israeli digest, argued that "the figures reported by B'Tselem about noncombatant minors includes children shielding combatants as they prepare and launch Qassam rockets or shielding gunmen as they engage in battle against Israeli forces." This was in response to a clarification by B'Tselem that the term "did not participate in hostilities" may include bystanders.

Caroline B. Glick, deputy managing editor of The Jerusalem Post, in an editorial for this journal asserts that B'Tselem is a radical leftist organization with a documented history of falsifying and distorting data. However, all Jewish members of it B'Tselem have completed their required military service in the IDF.

B'Tselem publishes the official responses and criticism of the Israeli military at the end of the majority of its print publications.

Organisation's Official Response to Criticism from CAMERA

The B'Tselem organisation replied to criticism from the mentioned organisations with the following response :

"B'Tselem stands behind the accuracy of its data, all based on independent fieldwork by its own well-trained staff. In all of the cases cited by CAMERA, the initial media reports or statements from the IDF were inaccurate. In fact, in some of these cases the Israeli military itself subsequently issued revised statements, and in at least one of these cases – the killing of Jamil al-Jabji – the military opened a criminal investigation, something they do very rarely regarding Palestinian deaths.
B'Tselem's methodology is completely transparent; indeed much of CAMERA's "ammunition" was taken from our own website. Palestinians employing potentially lethal force (guns, rockets, explosives, Molotov cocktails) are listed as having participated in hostilities at the time they were killed. The fact that a person carried a weapon but did not actually take it out and use it does not make that person a combatant. Likewise with regard to stone-throwing; in most situations, stone-throwing does not constitute lethal force. This does not relieve the stone-thrower of criminal liability, and his crime is plainly noted in our statistics. However, a 14 year-old boy throwing stones at an armoured jeep from a distance of over 50 feet – as was the case when soldiers shot Jamil al-Jabji – is not participating in an armed conflict, and the military does not need to respond with live ammunition (the fact that the military has initiated an investigation into this case would indicate that they retroactively agree). The devil is in the details. In those cases, where stone-throwing does indeed endanger lives (dropping cinder blocks from a roof, for example) this is classified as participation in hostilities.
B'Tselem no longer classifies Palestinians into civilians and security forces simply because all Palestinians are civilians. This same position was recently articulated by Israel's own High Court of Justice. Civilians are not always innocent - indeed B'Tselem does not claim that any particular victim was "innocent." Nor do we say that all of these killings constitute a breach of relevant law – though in many of the specific cases that we investigated in 2006 we did reach this conclusion. The High Court simply reiterated that there are only two categories of people in international humanitarian law: combatants and non-combatants. Palestinian civilians who engage in hostilities do so illegally and it is Israel's responsibility to arrest and bring them to justice. Before CAMERA advocates defining Palestinian militants are combatants, they should understand that this would acknowledge their right to engage in combat against Israeli soldiers, and to be recognized as prisoners of war, rather than being prosecuted."''

Representative Publications

• The Gaza Strip: One Big Prison (2007)
• Medical Personnel Harmed: The Delay, Abuse and Humiliation of Medical Personnel by Israeli Security Forces (2003)
• Thirsty for a Solution: The Water Shortage in the Occupied Territories and its Solution in the Final Status Agreement (2000)
• Land Grab: Israel's Settlement Policy in the West Bank (2005)

See also

• Hamoked
• Alternative information center
• Bimkom
• Bustan
• Meretz

External links

• B'Tselem official homepage
• B'Tselem official MySpace Video Project
• NGO Monitor's criticisms of B'Tselem
• "Human Rights vs. Politics: B´tselem Goes to Washington"
• Interview with Jessica Montell, executive director of B'Tselem, on DocsOnline: search keyword type Jessica Montell. Preview
• Interview with Jessica Montell, executive director of B'Tselem, about side-effects of the Israeli Occupation of Palestine