Barghouti rejects HRW report on 7 October as serious misstep

Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative, Mustafa Barghouti, has criticised Human Rights Watch (HRW) new report on the 7 October, 2023 attack as “a serious failure for an organisation that should have honestly adhered to the standards of human rights”.

In a press statement issued on Wednesday, Barghouti said “the report completely lacks objectivity and scientific professionalism and repeats, without justification or proof, the Israeli false narrative that has been refuted and proven incorrect by Western media, which cannot be accused of bias towards the Palestinian side.”

Barghouti believed “HRW has yielded to Israeli intellectual terrorism and perhaps American pressure, and is trying, with its new report, to please the Israeli occupation, which has continued its criticism of it due to its previous reference to Israeli war crimes”.

Barghouti stressed that “the objectivity and professionalism of any human rights organisation does not lie in playing an almost neutral role between the killer and the victim and between the perpetrator of the Israeli genocide and its victim, the Palestinian people, but rather in taking a firm stance against the aggressor war criminals and their crimes”.

“This serious lapse threatens the organisation’s reputation, which must apologise for what it did and withdraw its shameful report” he added.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Hamas Movement also rejected the HRW report, refuted the allegations contained in it and called on the organisation to withdraw it and apologise for it.

READ: Israel Knesset rejects bill for official inquiry into 7 October Hamas attack