Activities

• Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor (Euro-Med Monitor) consistently spreads blood libels and conspiracy theories about Israel, and accuses Israel of “apartheid,” genocide,” “ethnic cleansing,” “collective punishment,” and “war crimes.”
• In November 2023, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement promoting the blood libel that “The Israeli army has been holding the bodies of dozens of Palestinians killed during its genocide… called for… committee into organ theft suspicions… the Israeli army also dug up and confiscated the bodies from a mass grave… Israel is the only country that systematically holds the dead bodies of those it kills, and is classified as one of the world’s biggest hubs for the illegal trade of human organs” (emphases added).
• In November 2023, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement accusing Israel of using staff at Al Shifa hospital as human shields “to conduct an extensive combing and search operation in the hospital departments before carrying out horrific mass field executions… After failing to find any evidence of a military presence in the medical facility, the Israeli soldiers went crazy and deliberately carried out a series of executions, eliminating and directly shooting a number of the wounded in cold blood….” Euro-Med Monitor also  referred to “Israel’s absurd claims that Palestinian groups were using Al-Shifa Medical Complex and other hospitals in the Gaza Strip for military purposes…” 
• In October 2023, in the aftermath of the brutal Hamas attack on October 7, Euro-Med Monitor tweeted, “The crime scene has then been doctored & assault rifles appear to have been added to the bodies. These individuals may have been civilians who crossed the fence after its collapse. Their killing as they surrendered is an act of extrajudicial execution that constitutes a war crime.”
• In January 2023, Euro-Med Monitor published a report arguing that “Israeli army forces expanded the policy of summary executions… Targeting, shooting, and killing women and children was a routine practise of Israeli forces.”
• In February 2022 Euro-Med Monitor published a statement claiming, “the IHRA definition is being weaponized to suppress freedom of speech, muzzle Palestinian and pro-Palestinian voices and falsely equate legitimate criticism of Israel with anti-semitism.”
  • The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, adopted by more than 30 countries and counting, represents the international consensus definition of antisemitism, as well as how to distinguish between legitimate criticism of Israel and antisemitism. An example of the latter includes denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.
• In February 2022, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement defending a report published by Amnesty International accusing Israel of apartheid. According to the statement, “Demonizing Amnesty comes in the context of Israel’s systematic delegitimization campaign against human rights defenders.”
• In October 2021, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement claiming, “a civilian population caged in a toxic slum from birth to death are forced to witness the slow poisoning of their children and loved ones by the water they drink and likely the soil in which they harvest, endlessly, with no change in sight” (emphases added).
• In May 2021, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement claiming, “For decades Israel was successful in hiding these apartheid features from the world because the legacy of the Holocaust lent uncritical credence to the Zionist narrative” (emphasis added).

Ties to Terror

• Ramy Abdu, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor Founder and Chairman
  • In November 2020, Israel Minister of Defense Benjamin Gantz signed an administrative seizure order against Ramy Abdu under Israel’s anti-terrorism law. The order was issued “in relation to his work with the [Israeli]-designated terrorist organization ‘IPalestine- International Platform of NGOs Working for Palestine…that belongs to and acts on behalf of…Hamas” Abdu served as a Board member.
    • The order was in effect until August 1, 2022.
  • Ramy Abdu appeared on a 2013 list, published by Israel, of Hamas’ “main operatives and institutions” in Europe. The institutions included The European Campaign to End the Siege on Gaza (ECESG), European NGOs Empowerment Services (ENES), and the Council for European Palestinian Relations (CEPR).
    • A 2011 publication by Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center described Ramy Abdu as ECESG’s coordinator.
• Mazen Awni Issa Kahel (Mazen Kahel), Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor chair 2015–2019
  • Mazen Kahel appeared on a 2013 list, published by Israel, of Hamas’ “main operatives and institutions” in Europe. The institutions included The European Campaign to End the Siege on Gaza (ECESG), European NGOs Empowerment Services (ENES), and the Council for European Palestinian Relations (CEPR).

Ramy Abdu and Mazen Kahel posing next to Hamas political bureau leader and former Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh (2011)

BDS

• In October 2023, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement calling for “an immediate comprehensive arms embargo on Israel.” 
• In April 2023, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement calling on Denmark to “Investigate a company’s potential implication in Gaza war crimes” and “immediately put an end to both direct and indirect export of all kinds of military equipment to the Israeli government.”
• In December 2020, Euro-Med Monitor published an article titled, “Sanctions not normalisation are needed to stop Israel’s human rights abuses.” According to the article, “despite its long history of war crimes and violations of international law over the course of 72 years, successive Israeli governments are repeatedly rewarded with favored trading status, state welcomes for officials, and more. Yes, resolutions have been passed chiding their behavior, but actions are needed if anything is to change. Sanctions must be deployed consistently, fairly and humanely.”
• On March 11, 2019, Euro-Med Monitor spokeswomen Sarah Pritchett said, “Whether we agree with the BDS movement or not, one cannot deny that its activities as a peaceful campaign are legal.”
• In September 2017, Euro-Med Monitor published a statement calling for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights “to commit to the publication of the [black] list as scheduled before the end of this year…the biggest step compared to all previous efforts calling for the boycott of occupation and the normalization of settlements.”

Staff

• Muhammad Shehada, Chief of Programmes
  • In December 2023, Shehahda, Euro-Med Monitor Chief of Programmes, accused the IDF of “sexual assault” and “stripp[ing[ almost naked & torture” of two women prisoners, based on an image apparently showing “One … with her blue hijab on but with bare arms; the other had her hijab removed & is stripped down to her sleeping clothes!” 
  • In August 2023, Shehada published an article claiming, “When it comes to Palestinians, however, the Supreme Court has been fully complicit in legitimising, sustaining, and advancing a grim reality that the world’s largest human rights groups describe as ‘apartheid’ as well as ‘crushing Palestinian rights’… as it okayed the ethnic cleansing…”
  • In March 2023, Shedada tweeted a picture of himself with Ismail Haniyeh with the caption, “Talking a gently walk and a selfi with the ex-Prime Minister of#Gaza and the leader of #Hamas: #Ismail_Haniya.”
  • In February 2021, Shehada argued in an article that “Palestinian leaders who advocate for ‘armed resistance,’ because they say that negotiations have not worked, are ‘not wrong.’”
  • In January 2021, Shedada published an article calling on, “US President Joe Biden to ‘engage constructively’ with the Palestinian Authority, even if includes (sic) representatives deemed as terror-supporters, from Hamas or the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.”
  • In August 2020, Shehada published an article referring to the launching of incendiary balloons towards southern Israel as “distress signals.”
• Richard Falk
  • Richard Falk, Chairman of Board of Trustees of Euro-Med Monitor, is a “9/11 conspiracy theorist” who has been widely denounced, including by the former Secretary-General of the UN, for vile comments blaming the Boston terrorist attack on “the American global domination project” and “Tel Aviv.” He is also the author of an article “Slouching toward a Palestinian Holocaust” that compares Israel to Nazi Germany and has been condemned for publishing an antisemitic cartoon on his blog.
  • In August 2022, Falk is quoted as describing “the siege of Gaza as ‘prelude to genocide.’”
  • On March 15, 2017, the UN Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia published a report, co-authored by Falk, that relied heavily on NGO sources, accusing Israel of being “guilty of policies and practices that constitute the crime of apartheid.” UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres demanded the report’s removal. The head of UNESCWA resigned shortly thereafter.
• Ramy Abdu
  • In December 2023, Abdu, Euro-Med Monitor Chairman, accused the ICC prosecutor of “clear double standards” for not taking “a practical action” on “developments in occupied Palestinian territories and Gaza… which fit the definition of a genocide in the making under international law, Khan’s selective vision is a shameful affront to justice.”
  • In November 2023, Abdu tweeted, “The Arab governments misunderstand what is happening in Gaza.. What is going on is an ongoing, ongoing genocide… it is urgent to stop the Holocaust and genocide.”
  • In November 2023, Abdu referred to the IDF as “The most psychopath army in the world.”
  • In June 2022, Abdu sent a letter to the European Parliament demanding that EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen withdraw her acceptance of an honorary doctorate from Ben-Gurion University claiming, “acceptance of the BGU doctorate signals condoning the role Israeli academic institutions play in the occupation of Palestine.”