"Human rights" groups silent on German court case justifying synagogue attacks

Human Rights Watch, along with Amnesty International, claim that they are very much against antisemitism. They issued a joint statement in 2003:

Recognizing anti-Semitism as a serious human rights violation, we also recognize our own responsibility to take on this issue as part of our work. It should not be left to Jewish groups alone to highlight this issue and to appeal to the international community to address it. We are firmly committed to joining their ongoing efforts and to helping to bring problems of anti-Semitism into the overall human rights discourse.

I have noted previously that the groups have nothing to say about antisemitism in Arab countries. On the other hand, right-wing antisemitism in Europe has always been the one and only example of Jew-hatred that they would mention in their reports. As recently as Friday, HRW noted in an article that "Anti-Semitism remains a serious concern" in the EU in the context of right-wing xenophobia.

What about European antisemitism that pretends to be anti-Zionism?

We have a perfect example in this well-reported story also from Friday. This is how Vox, hardly a right-wing site, reported it:

A synagogue burning in Germany is perhaps among the most literal illustrations of anti-Semitism imaginable.

But apparently, not all synagogue burnings are equal.

This week a German regional court ruled that the 2014 firebombing of a synagogue in Wuppertal, a region just east of Düsseldorf, was an act of criminal arson, but not anti-Semitic. Instead, the court found it was a protest against Israel, even though the synagogue was obviously not in Israel and those who worship there are Jews, not Israelis.

The decision upheld that of a lower court, which stated the perpetrators, a trio of Palestinian-born German residents, wanted to “call attention to the Gaza conflict” when they prepared and then lobbed Molotov cocktails at the synagogue one July night in 2014. No one was injured, but the attack caused €800 in damages. The men were ultimately given suspended sentences.

The court’s decision is baffling — and deeply troubling. The men didn’t target the Israeli Embassy or one of its consulates. They attacked a Jewish institution. To conflate Israelis with Jews — and to say that a disagreement with the policies of the former somehow justifies attacking the latter — is by definition anti-Semitic. And if there is a line between anti-Israel sentiments and anti-Semitic ones, this attack definitely crossed it.

Ken Roth of Human Rights Watch tweets around two dozen times a day. But he didn't say a word about this. (Neither did Amnesty International.)

I tweeted Roth asking him what his opinion was, and he ignored me (and 30 retweets) - even as he tweeted on other topics. Including a swipe at Israel.

Apparently, HRW is only against some antisemitism, just as long as the bad guys are the same people that HRW considers bad to begin with. But Muslims or Arabs or their sympathizers cannot possibly be guilty of antisemitism, for the same reason the German judge gave:

Claims of being merely anti-Israel exonerates Jew-haters in both the German court system - and in "human rights" groups.

Remember this next time HRW and Amnesty ask you for money by claiming that they fearlessly speak "truth to power" about human rights. Jews obviously do not have human rights if their oppressors are on HRW's and Amnesty's "good guys" list.

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