NGO Lawfare update: PCHR and Al-Haq
Following the publication of NGO Monitor´s monograph NGO “Lawfare” : Exploitation of Courts in the Arab-Israeli Conflict, anti-Israel NGOs showed that they will continue to use the courts to pursue political and military objectives in Europe.
- According to a news report, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) created a “diplomatic mess” between Israel and Spain after filing a June 2008 suit in the National Court of Spain against seven former senior Israeli military officials. Using “war crimes” claims, PCHR focused on allegations related to a July 2002 IDF air strike against Sheik Salah Shehadah, a founder of Hamas´ military wing and a major terrorist. Similarly, in October 2008, PCHR joined Dutch lawyers to appeal the decision not to arrest Minister Ami Ayalon on arriving in the Netherlands in May 2008. PCHR pressured Dutch authorities for an “application for [Ayalon´s] arrest” for the alleged torture of a Palestinian prisoner in 1999 and 2000, when Ayalon was head of Israel´s General Security Service.
- On October 21, 2008, a British appellate court heard arguments in a suit initiated by Al-Haq regarding “arms-related licensing agreements with Israel. ” Moreover, on October 27, John Reynolds, who works for Al Haq, spoke at Harvard in support of a case filed in Quebec against corporations involved in housing construction in the West Bank. These cases are part of Al-Haq´s strategy of preparing “ready-to-be-used case files. . .to be activated in the courts of a number of third party states. ” Al-Haq is funded by the Ford Foundation, Christian Aid, European governments, and others.
- In October, Adalah, an Arab-Israeli NGO funded by the New Israel Fund (NIF), among others, publicized preparations for “lawfare” cases in Spain against Israeli police officers involved in the deaths of 13 Israeli-Arabs in the October 2000 riots “in solidarity with the Palestinian Intifada. ” This follows the Israeli Attorney General´s decision not to indict the officers, citing evidentiary problems and “the fact that the incident involved the use of operational judgment in an emergency situation. “