Harry's Place

To misquote a famous phrase, “who watches the Human Rights Watch?”

Sodomy non sapiens, Danny.

Isn’t it great to watch a corrupt outfit like HRW collapse and implode?

Sarah Whitson taking Saudi money, Joe Stork supporting the Munich massacre, Scott Long impersonating a Muslim to smear a gay activist, and now Marc Garlasco’s macabre Nazi toy fetish.

Pass the popcorn!

I would like to know if staffers at Human Rights Watch created a fake ‘activist’ with a Middle Eastern sounding name to forward its statements, to support arguments made by HRW officials, and to smear critics.

I don’t believe Human Rights Watch would do this deliberately, because it would effectively be suicide in terms of its credibility. I would imagine they’re embarrassed by this episode and will make sure it doesn’t recur.

Anyone else thinking of McNulty’s serial killer here?

This is very serious as the Asylum and Immigration Appeals Tribunals in England routinely are referred to HRW reports and often rely on them in making decisions. It would be dreadful if their credibility were undermined

My real concern is that Human Rights Watch may have been infiltrated and compromised by far-left activists…

I repeat that sentence for those interested in investing in the historic bridges of London.

Well, after reading this report below, I don’t see how anyone could deem HRW either credible or a valuable source of imformation.
http://www.ngo-monitor.org/article/experts_or_ideologues_systematic_analysis_of_human_rights_watch

More like grubby politics at its worst in my opinion.

Following their initial robust defense of Garlasco, HRW has been conspicuously silent. In my view, the main development over the last 24 hours has been this piece – http://justworldnews.org/archives/003787.html – by Helena Cobban, who has been a sympathetic obersver of Palestinian politics for several years, and a member of HRW’s Middle East Board – slamming Garlasco.

Cobban has since posted an update – http://justworldnews.org/archives/003789.html#more – in which she teasingly says, “I’ve just had a 30-minute phone conversation with Iain Levine, the over-all Director of Programs at HRW, about the Garlasco affair (which I’ll report on here as soon as I have time.)” So keep an eye on her blog.

In the same post, she also reproduces the full text of an HRW statement (which they did not post on their website to avoid drawing further attention to this scandal) which includes the following: “Some bloggers have picked up three comments Garlasco made on a memorabilia website in 2005, and a photo of him wearing a sweatshirt with a picture of the Iron Cross and the words in German: “The Iron Cross, 1813, 1870, 1914, 1939 and 1957.” The comments reflect the enthusiasm of a keen collector. They are not in any way indicative of support for Nazis, as has been alleged, and have no bearing on Garlasco’s work for Human Rights Watch.”

While we’re waiting for Cobban’s report of her conversation with Levine, can someone clarify re the 3rd para of Lucy’s post: is the plural of nemesis, er, nemesis?

I don’t believe Human Rights Watch would do this deliberately, because it would effectively be suicide in terms of its credibility.

What credibility?

This sort of crap is de rigeur with far-left NGOs like HRW, and has been for decades.

Once again, I told you so.

That would be nemeses, Ben.

These baseless accusations must come to an end. HRW has done more for Jews than Golda Meir.

HRW has done more for Jews than Golda Meir

Ari, would you mind explaining that comment? I find it utterly baffling.

Re: Ben’s linking to sympathetic observer of Palestinian politics, Helena Cobban’s blog post which contains: ‘Note on Marc Garlasco, from Human Rights Watch’, I found it interesting that the HRW statement is eager to show that wearing an Iron Cross sweatshirt is anodyne, but studiously avoids dealing with the double entendre Flak88 screen name and license plate Garlasco is so fond of, a double entendre which deliberately leaves open two interpretations, one of which being (at least for those in the know, nudge, nudge) an identifying of oneself as a Hitlerite.

a photo of him wearing a sweatshirt with a picture of the Iron Cross and the words in German: “The Iron Cross, 1813, 1870, 1914, 1939 and 1957.”

I wonder who the recipients of the 1939 Iron Cross were and what they had done during their careers to be bestowed with the honour by the Nazis?

He lost all credibility when he attacked Tatchell and when he retorted to the old “islamophobia” smear.

‘Ari Ben Zion’ is the type of unserious troll who posts ‘as a Jew, ‘as an Israeli’ and ‘as a Zionist’ simultaneously and is none of the above.

Lbnaz – exactly. The Nazi military used many different artillery pieces – so why did he pick as his on-screen moniker the one gun with a name that just happens to resonate for neo-Nazis?

“it would effectively be suicide in terms of its credibility”

Credibility? This distortion of the Geneva Conventions alone makes them uncredible; their constant claims that this or that is ‘against International Law’ is laughable.

The Nazi military used many different artillery pieces – so why did he pick as his on-screen moniker the one gun with a name that just happens to resonate for neo-Nazis?

As much as I don’t believe that the double entendre wasn’t purely intentional, still it might be noted that the Germans’ 88mm anti-aircraft gun served double duty as probably the best anti-tank gun of the war.

It is (or was), a famous weapon.

Yes… but you’d think a specialist in Luftwaffe AAA would be constantly annoyed by us laymen referring to it incorrectly as the ‘88′. That was the soldiers’ nickname for it, never any official designation. Why would such a geek use it then?

Lewis, that’s true, but still, it beggars belief that a guy who is this immersed in the sub-culture of nazi memorabilia didn’t know of the other meaning of “88″…

In any case, the most generous interpretation of Garlasco’s hobby depicts him as an over-enthusiastic childish geek – not a Nazi, but hardly the serious military historian of HRW’s press release. Going by what I’ve seen, though, I’m not inclined to be that generous.

Lewis, that’s true, but still, it beggars belief that a guy who is this immersed in the sub-culture of nazi memorabilia didn’t know of the other meaning of “88″…

Bingo.

No argument from me there.

Credibility?

not a Nazi, but hardly the serious military historian of HRW’s press release.

A military historian, on the basis of a book on German AA guns? As pointed out in the other thread, that makes him only a researcher, and similarly his book a monograph, at best.

In a hole, HRW is digging diligently.

“Were Human Rights Watch to be found to have engaged in such immoral and unethical behaviour, it would call into question their suitability as a monitor of global human rights abuses.”

I think you underestimate the capacity of people to rationalise anything away for ‘the cause.

After all, if the incidents mentioned by Lev at 11:04 pm didn’t do that, well…

I’d never even heard of Human Rights Watch until today. They are clearly doing great work, though.

I think the fact that they take Saudi money and then commission terror-supporters to write lies about Israel is actually quite cool.

Who cares if one of them gets off on Nazi gear? It’s no worse than someone getting off on pictures of kids. Stop your witch-hunt!

him wearing a sweatshirt with a picture of the Iron Cross and the words in German: “The Iron Cross, 1813, 1870, 1914, 1939 and 1957.”

Could somebody please explain 1957? What happened in that year to put it in the same league in German history as the others? Could someone please explain?

Lev: I am guessing here but perhaps it was re-introduced as a Wehrmacht medal? The Iron Cross is certainly still used a symbol in the modern Wehrmacht and Air Force.

yeah Meir, you’re right. so he’s celebrating the reintroduction of a symbol of Prussian/German warmongering. How very sensible of him.

Lbnaz at 12 September 2009, 1:02 am
‘Ari Ben Zion’ is the type of unserious troll who posts ‘as a Jew, ‘as an Israeli’ and ‘as a Zionist’ simultaneously and is none of the above.

Sure enough. It’s a ‘Zion’ variation on ‘Ari Ben Canaan’ of Exodus fame, which is probably the only pro-zionist reference ABZ can think of.

HRW would find the Allies guilty of War Crimes and the Nazis would be “innocent victims”

Too damn right, Cookie.

Bert Trautmann had the Iron Cross and he’s obviously a dude. Probably a lot of ICs went to great guys who soldiered bravely and never did anything particulaly evil.
Not that I’d want to wear it printed on a T shirt.
I was wondering about the 1957 too and yeah it gave me a jolt when I saw the first eurofighter on the news with the Iron Cross painted on it.

Heh Garlasco, if youre reading, come and join us, that is the Whole Sick Crew, we’re having a whale of a time looking for Slothrop before he dissolves.

According to wiki the ww2 Iron Cross medals had the swastika on them so the west german government minted neutral replacements with oak leaves instead starting in ‘57.

Ben Cohen: that HRW statement is on their website, under the rather strange title of ‘Protecting Civilians’.
http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/09/11/protecting-civilians

I must say that I find the way in which HRW has managed this whole affair so far exceedingly strange.
Any human rights organisation must ensure its impartiality, transparancy and honesty in order to be credible and acceptable. If I were Garlasco’s boss, I would have put out a statement to the effect of ‘we will conduct a full investigation because obviously such accusations, if found to have base, would compromise our organisation as a whole’.
Instead we are seeing reactions more suited to student politics than an organisation which presumably aspires to enjoy international status and credibility.
Could this possibly indicate that this organisation operates within a world view and perception of reality which is so severely distorted that it defines this organisational culture as normal?

Israelinurse, spot on!

Any organisation accused (or having its members accused) of a wrong, and given that this accusation is backed by reasonable evidence, has essentially two ways of response. The first is checking whether the accusation is right, gathering its own evidence, coming with measured response – and if there is a room to admit a wrong, doing so promptly. The second is coming with all guns blazing, throwing mud at the accuser and flatly refusing to contemplate that it could have ever done anything wrong. (In reality, most responses fall somewhere in-between.)

As an organisation ostensibly committed to human rights, HRW should seek response of the first kind from the many state and non-state agents about whose behaviour it is complaining. After all, what other purpose can there be to writing reports on the abuse of human rights? Yet, any complaints about the impartiality and integrity of its personnel are drawing an extreme and aggressive reaction of the second kind.

My own instincts tell me that in your reference to student politics you are putting your finger on the main issue here. It is not that HRW are “evil” or not committed individually and as an organisation to human rights – or at least to their own perception of those. It is that they are total amateurs and using their self-righteousness to cover up their clear absence of professionalism.

Serious human rights organisations are aware of the pitfalls of their work. Amnesty International, the most respected and effective of them, has a deliberate policy of a firewall between personal bias and human rights work. Thus, activists from country X will not deal with any issues relating to country X or its antagonists (sadly, even with this restriction, there is enough human rights work for everybody.) Thus, AI will never accept money from Saudi Arabia or similar regimes. Thus, AI will promptly admit to its own mistakes (as in the case of Jenin) and correct them openly. Thus, AI will not use long-standing political activists as lead personnel on issues on which they have been involved earlier in their political persona. AI knows full well that the perception of its integrity and credibility is the only weapon it has. HRW, on the other hand, apparently believes that bluster is its own weapon of mass argument. They should, at the first instance, grow up.

Either they should watch human rights professionally and wear their integrity on the sleeve or they should leave this vital and necessary work to those who can do it right.

“My real concern is that Human Rights Watch may have been infiltrated and compromised by far-left activists…”

ROFLMAO

HRW doesn’t show the slightest sense of embarrassment or shame in having an obssessive collector of Nazi junk who wears Nazi T-shirts in their organisation. This is quite enough; one needs no more information about them.

My real concern is that Human Rights Watch may have been infiltrated and compromised by far-left activists, and that their conduct is undermining the mission of this important body.

Go on with you.

Pull the other one.

Could somebody please explain 1957? What happened in that year to put it in the same league in German history as the others? Could someone please explain?

Apparently,
“In 1957 a special version of the cross was produced. On this the Swastika was replaced with an oak leaf. The way military actions of the Second World War could be honoured without the use of the forbidden Nazi-symbols. Most veterans however choose to wear the decoration as a ribbon only. Most 1957 versions are of a lesser quality than wartime examples.”

The Iron Cross has not been issued by the Wehrmacht.

“Heil…hail the Wehrmacht…I mean the Bundeswehr”

You can joke if you wish.

I believe that the modern German state has acquitted itself very well in the last 50 years.

It would be a shame if HRW’s good work in places like Venezuela was discredited because of its self-inflicted foolishness.

There was a Channel 4 documentary about Nazi re-enactors/collectors a few months ago. Regardless of people who collect this sort of stuff out of pure interest in the designs etc, the programme showed that there was a large degree of neo-Nazi infiltration into this sort of thing.

I wonder how many Neo-Nazis have bought Garlasco’s book?

Regardless of whether or not the guy is a crypto-fascist, his chosen area of ‘interest’ is notorious for attracting people who hide their Nazi ideology beneath a supposedly legitimate interest in nazi memorabilia (’its just a hobby’). At the bare minimum, Garlasco and HRW should realise this. It is utterly bizarre that they don’t (and then compound it with the old ‘its all an Israeli smear campaign’ bullshit).

“You can joke if you wish.”

Clap Hammer, the joke was on me for writing ‘Wehrmacht’ instead of ‘Bundeswehr.’ I’m sorry I should have made that clearer.

‘I believe that the modern German state has acquitted itself very well in the last 50 years.’

Israel’s Dolphinim are U-Boot Type 212s. I have an interest in experimental Luftwaffe jet types and designs: so many of them became US and USSR types.

ditto re. u boots. The type xxi electric boot was evolved by the USSR and Chinese.

There are huge gray areas here as between true “collectors” and the obviously overlapping neo-nazi movement. I have been on numerous other “milblog” sites in which serious collectors have come to his defense quite vociferously seeing attacks on Garlasco as possibly leading to a blanket attack on the entire gamut of collectors in German WWII memorabelia. Admittedly many (if not most) of these defenders of Garlasco on these sites are unfamiliar with the context and politics of it all–some blindly so–in that they are collectors first and foremost; but it does point out how subjects such as this can be quite amorphous in an amoeba-like way with ever-shifting points of emphasis depending on one’s background and interests, and only underscores the fact that when hurling charges around in this area–whatever their merits–one should be very sure of one’s facts and very specific in charges made and examples given.

There are two other threads to discuss Marc Garlasco’s Nazi obsessions. This thread is to discuss sock-puppetry. Could I ask that people stay on topic.

Here’s your quote:

I loved this quote… almost as much as I love cameras.

Sorry Lucy.

BTW, sock puppetry is particularly rampant in the world of local newspapers. I would say that the majority of reader’s letters printed are sent by or at the behest of members of local parties, or even ghost-written by MPs and passed to somebody else to provide plausible deniability.

This thread is to discuss sock-puppetry. Could I ask that people stay on topic.

I enjoyed the witty* comment by the Pynchon sockpuppet @ 6:05 pm, in response to the Pynchon character sockpuppet’s sneer of a comment @ 9:57 am.

* click on the Tom Pynchon handle in the ‘name’ field

Thanks for the sock puppet link. My IP address comes out accurate but other people’s I’ve checked don’t come from the city they say they come from. Re-routed servers I suppose?

There should be training courses to would-be sock-puppets. Even if the sock puppet is doing it without the knowledge of the person they’re defending, if they’re caught they make the person look like an idiot. Repeating the same message under 5 really bland monikers is the mark of an amateur, never mind the give away IP address.

My real concern is that Human Rights Watch may have been infiltrated and compromised by far-left activists

What is Peter Tatchell, if not a far-left activist?

Speaking of sock puppets, could the HP people check whether the IP if “Smear Watch” in the other thread is in fact the same one that posted HRW’s press release?

My real concern is that Human Rights Watch may have been infiltrated and compromised by far-left activists, and that their conduct is undermining the mission of this important body. I hope I am wrong, but either way, I’d like to know.

Don’t know about “far left activists”, but there seems to be quite some extensive evidence that HRW reporting on Israel is consistent with an institutional anti-Israel bias typical of hard left stances on Israel. This is not just linked to Garlasco, but to HRW’s stance per se. See particularly the exchange of comments between Gerald Steinberg (including citations) and the blogger concerned.

In particular, there seems to be a repeated track record of HRW reports issued at the time of particular attacks attributed to Israel which firmly lay the responsibility at Israel’s feet, and declare that they are war crimes/crimes against humanity etc. These are subsequently then followed by low-key, low-profile admissions of gross errors and inaccuracies long after the story has dropped out of the headlines.

It’s striking how repeatedly HRW also further amplifies the vilification of Israel in the press releases it uses in issuing the sensationalist reports. To do this once might be something not particularly significant. To do it repeatedly looks too much like an organization with a hard left agenda. And especially a hard left anti-Israel agenda.

Here’s Helena Cobban’s latest – http://justworldnews.org/archives/003793.html – which is largely a response to Garlasco’s dishonest, cringe-making piece on the Huffington Post in which he admitted to a “handful” (actually, over 7,000) of “juvenile” postings and then ended on a note of delusional pomposity: “And because of the intense suffering during the Second World War and the genocidal campaign against the Jewish people, I spend my days doing what I can to ensure that such horrors are never allowed to happen again.” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marc-garlasco/human-rights-watch-invest_b_284075.html

It’s just, like, yechhhh. It also seems that HRW has no intention of canning Garlasco, given that they are allowing him to write garbage like this.

His modus operandi, in a nutshell, consists of cheap and groundless accusations of racism, colonialism and Islamophobia. These are the familiar slurs of the far Left activist. They work best when the person deploying them is not, as Long is, a white, male Westerner.

Norman ‘@#$%!&’ Finkelstein must be the exception to that rule. Or maybe in his case and context, that he isn’t a gentile, white, male Westerner, is what gives his ravings “authenticity”.

What I’d like to know is how in the name of critical thinking, do people get away with defining the moral suasion and veracity of any position to be determined primarily by the national, racial, sexual, identity claimed by its proponent?

Is this some sort of old-new shibboleth (are you, or aren’t you an authentic anti-Western imperialism activist from the third world?) promulgated by those Christopher Lasch coined as the ‘cult of authenticity’? Do these cultists have something personal against critical thinking?

Helena Cobban is a Bit*h.

It also seems that HRW has no intention of canning Garlasco

Did you seriously think that HRW would can Garlasco when our political culture deems legitimate and affords populist political capital -that could lead to increased fundraising capital- to innuendo grounded notions of an omnipotent Israel Lobby that supposedly has the means at its disposal to silence all comers, save for political, intellectual and spiritual martyrs like Norman @#$!% Finkelstein, Steve Walt, John Mearsheimer, Jimmy Carter, Desmond Tutu and wait for it… Mark Garlasco, whom they smear?

HRW might as well adopt the Iron Cross 1813, 1870, 1914, 1939 & 1957, as their logo: it would speak to their courage in standing up to the Protocols of the Elders of Israel Lobby.

I mean, if not for Garlasco, who would have ever realized that the fetishizing of Nazi toys with other Nazi and non-Nazi toy fetishists and collectors and the unfettered ability to choose for oneself a half Hitler, half big Wermacht Gun double entendre on-line screen name and license plate, while being gainfully employed as a report writer in the Israeli War Crimes department of a major, professional, “in the news”, HR NGO, is actually a human right that must be defended.

And who but HRW are best suited to defend this newly discovered human right?

I’ve just taken the trouble to read all of Helena Cobban’s posts (& the comments) on this subject seeing as she seems to be the only member of HRW who is being remotely open on the subject.

She and the majority of the commentators there just don’t get it.
They seem to be incapable of understanding the significance of the connection between Garlasco’s wierd hobby and his work. They seem to be blind to the questions this affair raises about HRW’s process of vetting its employees and what sort of culture exists within that organisation. Cobban states that there is no anti-Semitism within HRW, and indeed points out that many of its emplyees are Jewish (a sort of corporate ’some of my best friends..’), but we know that both advocates of boycotts against Israel and ‘one-staters’ have been recruited to its ranks.

Since this affair broke I keep thinking of those people walking Israel’s streets with the indelible numbers tatooed on their forearm. People who sought refuge in the one country that would have them after they’d lost everything and sometimes everyone. People who have battled with the memories and the nightmares for 65 years and tried to rebuild something positive to prove to themselves and the world that life and hope could triumph over that criminal Nazi death cult.

And then by stark contrast there’s this creep who thinks that the leather jackets of their torturers are ‘cool’ and proudly displays the insignia of the murderers of their families whilst at the same time exploiting his public position to damn and disparage what they have rebuilt from the ashes of their lives. A creep who represents an organisation which furnishes political credibility on the world stage to another group of cultish murderers who would willingly put these survivors through the same torture and nightmare yet again.
Utter madness.

Thank you for the useful tutorial on how to research comment origin. :)

Israelinurse: exactly. When you see the big picture, the nausea is overwhelming.

Oh and Lucy Lips -seeing as on Helena Cobban’s blog anyone connected with breaking this story, anyone of the opinion that Garlasco has a case to answer, and indeed anyone Israeli is labelled with that ultimate damning brand of (shock, horror, disbelief) ‘Right Wing’, I think your above fears regarding far-Left activists could well be justified.

If Garlasco loses his post at HRW he might like to consider acting as consultant for the burgeoning genre of Nazi Zombie flicks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEQwEmeWnyI&feature=related

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=garlasco

“Anyone else thinking of McNulty’s serial killer here?”
I hadn’t thought of that.

The funniest thing of all is that HRW responded with hurt outrage when they were “outed” in their funding from Saudi Arabia. But the Arab countries, who are swimming in money they didn’t earn that pours in from their oil revenues, would much rather spend it on anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda than on helping their suffering compatriots. BTW, Richard Goldstone gave away his own biases on BBC Newsnight yesterday when he referred to Gaza as “occupied Palestinian territory”. Needless to say the interviewer, who was either ignorant or complicit, did not point out that the Israelis left Gaza five years ago.

The funniest thing of all is that HRW responded with hurt outrage when they were “outed” in their funding from Saudi Arabia. But the Arab countries, who are swimming in money they didn’t earn that pours in from their oil revenues, would much rather spend it on anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda than on helping their suffering compatriots. BTW, Richard Goldstone gave away his own biases on BBC Newsnight yesterday when he referred to Gaza as “occupied Palestinian territory”. Needless to say the interviewer, who was either ignorant or complicit, did not point out that the Israelis left Gaza five years ago.

The funniest thing of all is that HRW responded with hurt outrage when they were “outed” in their funding from Saudi Arabia. But the Arab countries, who are swimming in money they didn’t earn that pours in from their oil revenues, would much rather spend it on anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda than on helping their suffering compatriots. BTW, Richard Goldstone gave away his own biases on BBC Newsnight yesterday when he referred to Gaza as “occupied Palestinian territory”. Needless to say the interviewer, who was either ignorant or complicit, did not point out that the Israelis left Gaza five years ago.

The funniest thing of all is that HRW responded with hurt outrage when they were “outed” in their funding from Saudi Arabia. But the Arab countries, who are swimming in money they didn’t earn that pours in from their oil revenues, would much rather spend it on anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda than on helping their suffering compatriots. BTW, Richard Goldstone gave away his own biases on BBC Newsnight yesterday when he referred to Gaza as “occupied Palestinian territory”. Needless to say the interviewer, who was either ignorant or complicit, did not point out that the Israelis left Gaza five years ago.

The funniest thing of all is that HRW responded with hurt outrage when they were “outed” in their funding from Saudi Arabia. But the Arab countries, who are swimming in money they didn’t earn that pours in from their oil revenues, would much rather spend it on anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda than on helping their suffering compatriots. BTW, Richard Goldstone gave away his own biases on BBC Newsnight yesterday when he referred to Gaza as “occupied Palestinian territory”. Needless to say the interviewer, who was either ignorant or complicit, did not point out that the Israelis left Gaza five years ago.