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Why Amnesty International Whispers About Hamas Yet Shouts About Israel
Illustration with the logo of Amnesty International on the vest of an observer of a demonstration in Paris, France, Paris, on Dec. 11, 2021. Photo: Xose Bouzas / Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect
More than two years after Hamas perpetrated its massacre on Oct. 7, 2023, Amnesty International finally released a report documenting those crimes. But they’ve made it quite hard to locate.
Amnesty’s home page currently has links to articles titled “Stand with the woman accused of witchcraft in Ghana” and “Demand accountability in Tanzania,” but the Hamas report is nowhere to be found.
If you navigate to their page about Israel, you can only get there if you know where to click.
This is the title of the report’s release: “Sustainable peace requires international justice for all victims of all crimes in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
The first subheading is: “Israel’s ongoing genocide, apartheid and unlawful occupation.” It goes on for 11 paragraphs detailing those accusations, but the link to the report about Hamas is also somewhere in there.
Amnesty claims that the long delay is nothing unusual, as it is difficult to accurately document evidence in a war zone. But this did not stop them from issuing a nearly 300 page report accusing Israel of genocide over a year ago. Or a report last month titled, “Post-ceasefire: Israel’s genocide in the occupied Gaza Strip continues.”
When it comes to condemning Israel, Amnesty runs and shouts. With regard to condemning Hamas, they go at a snail’s pace and then whisper.
It turns out, according to reporting from The Free Press, that there was significant pushback within Amnesty against releasing the Hamas report at all. Some Amnesty officials complained that “the situation in Gaza is getting worse,” and “the report could be used by Israel to justify its actions.” If it was released in the Fall, they were concerned it also might interfere with recognition of Palestinian statehood at the United Nations.
But doesn’t failure to condemn the Hamas attack give the impression that it was somehow justified, and make Hamas more likely to do it again? And doesn’t Amnesty’s constant vilification of Israel risk inciting violence against Jews and Israelis, as we have unfortunately seen so much of, including just recently at Bondi Beach in Australia?
Amnesty claims the universality and indivisibility of human rights as core values, along with impartiality and independence. What we see in its long-delayed and downplayed condemnation of Hamas atrocities, however, is its betrayal of its own principles in favor of advocacy for a popular political cause.
Human rights were created to establish norms of behavior that protect all people, regardless of politics, history, or culture. It’s well known that many perceive Palestinians as battling Israeli oppression and domination in a fight for freedom. Others think Palestinians have time and again rejected actual offers of statehood or independence, and are using these claims as mere cover for what is really a fight for Israel’s destruction. These two narratives are deeply conflicting and, for many, irreconcilable.
The proper role of human rights is to step in and say that even though we cannot agree on even the basic historical narrative of what’s happening, there are universal norms of behavior that bind us. No matter how much Palestinians believe they are oppressed and their cause is righteous, they cannot fire rockets at Israeli cities, attack Israeli civilians, or hold Israelis hostage. And no matter how certain Israel feels that Palestinians are aiming for its destruction, it may not use indiscriminate force, deny civilians aid, or engage in collective punishment.
This is what Amnesty should campaign for, without taking sides as to who has the moral high ground. But unfortunately, Amnesty has completely adopted the Palestinian narrative of victimhood, and then distorted human rights to advocate for the Palestinian cause. It emphasizes Israeli violations in ways that generate political pressure and outrage, while minimizing and contextualizing Hamas atrocities to avoid political fallout.
This turns human rights from universal standards into political weapons. It means Amnesty loses credibility with all who do not accept its political slant, and that it has no more moral authority than anyone else with an opinion.
When we are upset by the conduct of organizations such as Amnesty, we have to remember that human rights themselves are not the problem. In fact, human rights have never been more needed than now. The problem is so-called human rights groups that throw away their mission in order to take sides in political issues and campaign for causes.
When human rights organizations abandon universality for advocacy, they do not advance justice — they undermine the very idea of human rights itself.
Shlomo Levin is the author of the Human Rights Haggadah, and he uses short fiction and questions to explore human rights at https://shalzed.com/
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Ukraine, Russia Swap 193 Prisoners of War Each in US, UAE-Facilitated Exchange
Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) react after a swap, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, at an unknown location in Ukraine, April 24, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Anatolii Stepanov
Ukraine and Russia conducted a prisoner of war swap on Friday, sending back 193 captured personnel each in an exchange both sides said was facilitated by the United States and the United Arab Emirates.
“It is important that there are exchanges and that our people are returning home,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a post on Telegram.
His chief of staff, Kyrylo Budanov, and Russia‘s defence ministry said the US and the UAE had assisted with the exchange.
Russia and Ukraine have conducted many prisoner swaps over four years of war, exchanging thousands of captives in total.
Zelenskiy said some of the returned captives, who included soldiers, border guards, and police, had injuries, while others had faced criminal charges in Russia.
In Ukraine, returning captives streamed off buses, many draped in their country’s flag and overwhelmed with emotion.
“It still hasn’t sunk in that I’m home, I was in captivity for three years … our Ukrainian sky, our trees — this is happiness,” said Serhiy, a soldier, who gave only his first name.
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Main Suspect in Syria’s Tadamon Massacre Arrested, Ministry Says
Residents gather in a street after Friday prayers to celebrate the arrest of Amjad Yousef, a key suspect in the 2013 Tadamon massacre, in Tadamon, Syria, April 24, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
Syria’s Interior Ministry said on Friday it had arrested the main suspect in the 2013 Tadamon massacre, one of the worst acts of violence attributed to the former government of Bashar al-Assad, in which 288 civilians were killed.
The ministry released footage of Amjad Yousef’s arrest in the Al-Ghab Plain area of Hama province in western Syria, near his hometown. Yousef had been hiding there since the overthrow of Assad at the end of 2024, a security source told Reuters.
US Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack welcomed the arrest in a post on X, calling it an important step towards accountability for atrocities committed during Syria’s war.
DOCUMENTING THE MASSACRE
Yousef, 40, a former member of military intelligence under Assad, was thrust into the spotlight in April 2022 when the UK’s Guardian newspaper published videos provided by two academics that they said showed him forcing blindfolded civilians to run towards a pit in the Tadamon neighborhood of southern Damascus before shooting them.
Annsar Shahoud, a researcher at the University of Amsterdam Holocaust and Genocide Center and one of the academics, spent four years documenting the massacre.
Posing as an online fangirl, Shahoud gained Yousef’s trust and ultimately obtained his confessions both on video and audio recording.
Reuters was unable to reach Yousef for comment as he has been taken into custody.
The massacre is one of the most egregious documented incidents of violence attributed to the Assad government during the 14-year bloody war that began in 2011.
After Assad’s fall at the end of 2024, civilians, media outlets and international organizations went to the site of the massacre to inspect it and interview witnesses. Locals refer to the site as “Amjad Yousef’s Pit.” It has been marked on Google Maps as “The Site of the Tadamon Massacre.”
Ahmed Adra, a Tadamon resident and a member of the neighborhood committee, said victims’ families had been celebrating in the streets since morning.
“We will take white roses and plant them at the site of the massacre and tell the victims that their memory is alive and that justice is being served,” he told Reuters.
Shahoud said she now felt safe with Yousef in custody, but added the path to justice in Syria was unclear and did not include all perpetrators.
“I feel safe now, despite the distance, because I always felt for years that this person was after me,” she told Reuters.
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Merz Floats Sanctions Relief for Iran Peace Deal, Other EU Leaders Cautious
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz speaks during a cabinet meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Feb. 4, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Liesa Johannssen
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz suggested on Friday that the European Union could ease sanctions on Tehran as part of a comprehensive deal that would end the Iran war, but other EU leaders struck a more cautious note.
The 27-nation EU has imposed sanctions on Iran for years, including travel bans and asset freezes for senior officials and entities, in response to human rights violations, nuclear activities, and military support for Russia.
US officials have suggested a comprehensive deal covering Iran‘s nuclear and missile programs and the re-opening of the Strait of Hormuz could bring a lasting end to the US-Israeli war with Tehran, beyond the current ceasefire.
After an EU summit in Cyprus, Merz said the bloc could gradually ease sanctions on Iran in the event that a comprehensive agreement was reached.
European leaders have been largely sidelined in the current Middle East conflict but some European officials see the bloc’s sanctions as a possible way for the EU to be involved in a diplomatic solution.
“The easing of sanctions can be part of a process,” Merz told reporters after the Nicosia summit.
“No one has objected to that,” he said of the summit deliberations. “It is, so to speak, part of the contribution we can make to advance this process and, hopefully, lead to a permanent ceasefire.”
But European Council President Antonio Costa, the chair of the summit, told a press conference after the end of the meeting: “It is too early to talk about relieving any kind of sanctions.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said sanctions relief could only come after clear evidence of fundamental changes of course from Iran.
“We believe that sanctions relief should be conditional on verification of de-escalation, particularly on progress on the international effort to contain its nuclear threat, and on a change to the repression of its own people,” she told the same press conference.