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Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - HAMILTON, Canada — Omar Shakir, the Israel-Palestine director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), and assistant researcher Milena Ansari have resigned saying the organization’s new chief blocked a report that labeled Israel's denial of Palestinian refugees' right of return a "crime against humanity.”
The resignations come as HRW's new executive director, Philippe Bolopion, begins his tenure amid heightened scrutiny of the group's Israel-Palestine work.
A report Tuesday by Jewish Currents said they have obtained the resignation letters of Shakir and Ansari. Shakir wrote that the HRW leadership's decision broke from standard review processes and reflected fear of political backlash rather than legal or factual concerns.
"I have lost my faith in the integrity of how we do our work and our commitment to principled reporting on the facts and application of the law," Shakir said, according to the report.
The unpublished 33-page report documented the experiences of Palestinians displaced from Gaza, the occupied West Bank and refugee communities in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria, connecting decades of denied return to prosecutable crimes under international law.
The report was slated to be published on December 4 and had been given the greenlight by others in HRW during an internal review, Shakir said.
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HRW’s leadership claimed that the report raised "complex and consequential issues" and that further analysis was needed before publication.
In a statement to Al Jazeera, HRW confirmed that it had received the resignations of two people working on Israel-Palestine after “a decision to pause the publication of a draft report on the right of return of Palestinian refugees”.
“The report in question raised complex and consequential issues. In our review process, we concluded that aspects of the research and the factual basis for our legal conclusions needed to be strengthened to meet Human Rights Watch’s high standards,” the group said.
But Shakir said on the US social media company X’s platform that "the report was finalized after 7 months in review & signed off on by the MENA division, five different specialists, the Program Office & the Law & Policy Office."
"It was coded to the website & translated, a press release & Q/A were drafted & vetted & partners briefed. Hardly a rush," he said.
Shakir and Ansari said attempts to narrow the report's scope to recent displacements undermined its legal argument and silenced the voices of generations of refugees.
Over 200 HRW staff protested the delay, warning it could damage the organization's credibility. — Agencies
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