Terre des Hommes

Profile

Country/TerritorySwitzerland
Websitewww.terredeshommes.org
Founded1959
In their own words "to work for the rights of the child and to promote equitable development without racial, religious, cultural or gender-based discrimination."

Funding

Activities

  • Terre des Hommes (TdH) partners with Addameer for an ongoing campaign “documenting and providing legal support to Palestinian children of East Jerusalem.” The campaign makes numerous false and misleading claims about the IDF and Israeli military courts and relies on an inaccurate March 2013 UNICEF report that alleged “widespread, systematic and institutionalized” ill-treatment of children within the system. (Read NGO Monitor’s report “No Way to Represent a Child: Defense for Children International Palestine’s Distortions of the Israeli Justice System.”)
  • In August 2021, TdH organized a summer camp with the Burj Al-Luqluq Social Center Society. According to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), an NGO that reports on incitement, Burj al Laqlaq has a long history of promoting violent messages. For instance, “[in 2012] the Burj Luq-Luq Social Center Society organization performed a puppet show for children in East Jerusalem to promote non-smoking. The educational message delivered by the puppets instructed children to replace cigarettes with machine guns.” According to PMW, Burj Luq-Luq hosted a 2014 soccer tournament named for PLO terrorist Abu Jihad and organized a tournament named for Ibrahim Al-Akari, who murdered two Israeli civilians in a November 2014 attack in Jerusalem.
  • On April 7, 2018, as a member of the Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA), TdH released a statement “condemning Israel’s unlawful killing of civilians” during the Gaza-border violence and called for an “independent and transparent investigation into the killing and injuring of civilians in the context of peaceful demonstrations, and for those responsible to be held to account.” The statement ignored the violent nature of the protests, which have consisted of an organized armed attack on the Israeli border and IDF positions, attempts to destroy and breach the border fence, and sustained arson, rocket, and mortar attacks on Israeli civilian communities.
  • In March 2018, TdH released a documentary video titled “GazaReal” illustrating “an immersive experience of what life is really like in Gaza with its challenges and potential.” The video placed sole blame on Israel and the blockade for the continuation of the conflict, while altogether omitting that the blockade was implemented in an effort to stop Palestinian terrorists from smuggling weapons and rockets into Gaza that would later be used to target Israeli civilians.
  • TdH endorsed the 2016 Woman’s Boat to Gaza, which attempted to break the blockade around Gaza and instigate a confrontation with the Israeli Navy.
  • Signatory to the April 2015 Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA) joint agency briefing paper “Charting a New Course: Overcoming the Stalemate in Gaza,” misrepresenting international law and distorting legal terminology to place primary blame for the 2014 Gaza war on Israel. The paper omits Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli civilians, as well as terror tunnels running beneath the border into Israel. The paper further encourages contact with Hamas, stating: “Restricted contact can undermine humanitarian access and implementation of humanitarian programmes…”
  • In August 2015, TDH Italy was a signatory on a joint call “urging world leaders to press the Israeli government to lift the blockade on Gaza and remove the restrictions on basic building materials needed to reconstruct the coastal strip,” as “there can never be justification for collective punishment of an entire population.”
  • In July 2015, TDH Italy and Oxfam Italy signed a letter to Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi calling on the Italian government to “exact compliance on Israel with international law and humanitarian law in the occupied Palestinian territory and end the blockade on Gaza, which constitutes collective punishment in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.”
  • In December 2014, TDH signed a statement of “solidarity with women in Gaza,” calling on the “Government of Israel to end its military occupation, which continues to impede upon the fundamental rights of all Palestinians in Gaza.”
  • In December 2013, TDH was a signatory on a statement denouncing Israeli home demolitions as they “facilitate the expansion of illegal Israeli settlements and the destruction of civilian property is a violation of International Human Rights Law and International Humanitarian Law.”
  • On November 19, 2012, issued a joint statement with 44 other highly politicized organizations, calling on the international community to “apply immediate pressure on the government of Israel” and warning of a “widespread humanitarian disaster in Gaza brought on by a prolonged [Israeli] military occupation.”
  • In November 2011, TDH took part in an anti-weapon campaign that lobbied the Members of Parliament of the Christian Democrat party to disrupt Germany’s arms trade with Israel and other states accused of not respecting international humanitarian standards. This campaign was conducted in cooperation with other NGOs including Human Rights WatchBread for the World-EED, SODI (Solidarität Dienst), Oxfam Germany, Caritas, Kritische Aktionäre, and Facing Finance.

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