Kenneth Roth | |
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 Roth during the Munich Security Conference, 2018 | |
| Born | September 23, 1955 Elmhurst, Illinois, U.S. |
| Education | Brown University (BA) Yale University (JD) |
| Known for | Executive director of Human Rights Watch |
| Spouse | Annie Sparrow (m. 2011) |
Kenneth Roth (born September 23, 1955) is an American attorney, human rights activist, and writer. He was the executive director of Human Rights Watch (HRW) from 1993 to 2022.
Kenneth Roth was born on September 23, 1955, in Elmhurst, Illinois, to Muriel T. Roth and Walter S. Roth. His father was a Jewish refugee who fled Nazi Germany. [1] [2] [3] Walter's family had a butchery in Germany near Frankfurt when Adolf Hitler came to power.
Kenneth Roth grew up in Deerfield, Illinois. [4] He graduated from Brown University in 1977 with a BA in history [1] and received his Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 1980. [5]
On June 13, 2011, Roth was married in an Anglican church to Annie Sparrow. [3]
Roth worked in private practice as a litigator and served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the United States Department of Justice for the Southern District of New York and the Iran-Contra investigation in Washington DC. [6] Roth's career in human rights began inauspiciously. The one human rights course offered at Yale Law School was repeatedly canceled, and upon graduation he found that jobs in the field were few. As a result, as he worked as a lawyer, and volunteered nights and weekends doing human rights work, focusing on [7] the Soviet imposition of martial law in Poland in 1981. [8]
Roth joined Human Rights Watch (HRW) in 1987 as deputy director. His initial work centered on Haiti [9] and gradually extended to Cuba [10] and the Middle East, [11] among other places.
Since 1993 (when Aryeh Neier left to become head of George Soros's Open Society Institute), Roth became the executive director [6] of HRW. While he was in the office, the HRW staff increased from 60 to 552; HRW shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for banning of anti-personnel mines, helped to establish International Criminal Court and ban children in the military. Roth resigned from HRW on 31 August 2022. [12] After leaving HRW, Roth said he intended to write a book. [4]
Roth received honorary degrees from Brown University, [13] Bowdoin College, [14] the University of Ottawa, [15] and the American University of Paris. [16] He was a recipient of the Athens Democracy Award, [17] the William Rogers Award [18] from Brown University and the Jean Mayer Global Citizenship Award [19] from Tufts University. He serves on the Watson Institute Board of Overseers [20] at Brown University, the Board of Governors of Bard College Berlin, [21] and the Humanitarian and Development Advisory Panel of the Novo Nordisk Foundation. [22]
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Following a 2006 HRW report on the 2006 Lebanon war, Roth wrote a letter to the editor of The New York Sun in which he criticized the Israeli response to Hezbollah's rocket attacks on northern Israeli towns by quoting the Old Testament: "An eye for an eye—or, more accurately in this case, twenty eyes for an eye—may have been the morality of some more primitive moment." [23] In reaction, the Anti-Defamation League accused him of using a "classic anti-Semitic stereotype against Jews". A following editorial in The New York Sun decried the statement: "To suggest that Judaism is a primitive religion incompatible with contemporary morality is to engage in supersessionism, the de-legitimization of Judaism, the basis of much antisemitism". Georgetown law professor and columnist Rosa Brooks called this criticism of Roth an example of reflexive labeling of criticism of Israel as antisemitism, and said that anyone accusing Roth of antisemitism must be "insane". [24]
HRW founder Robert Bernstein said to The Jerusalem Post in April 2011 that in relation to the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, which issued the Goldstone Report, Roth "seeks to minimize the importance of Judge Goldstone's stunning retraction of his war crime accusations against Israel." [25] Bernstein said of Roth, "it is time for him to follow Judge Goldstone's example and issue his own mea culpa." [25] On 14 April 2011, the U.N report's three other co-authors released a joint statement criticizing Goldstone's partial recantation. [26]
In 2014, Roth tweeted, "Germans rally against anti-Semitism that flared in Europe in response to Israel's conduct in Gaza war. Merkel joins." Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic criticized Roth, saying Roth "blame[d] the Jewish state for the violent acts of anti-Semites" and that "it is a universal and immutable rule that the targets of prejudice are not the cause of prejudice." [27] Raphael Magarik disagreed with Goldberg in an opinion for The Forward, writing "denying that Israel’s behavior has any causal role in anti-Semitism is deeply counter-intuitive." [28] Michael Rubin, of the American Enterprise Institute called for Roth to step down stating that he "appears increasingly intent to subordinate the organization he leads to a much more limited and subjective political agenda." [29] Roth also tweeted a controversial advertisement equating the war with "Nazi genocide" followed by the Holocaust tagline "Never again". United States Special Envoy for Monitoring and Combating Anti-Semitism Deborah Lipstadt called this language "soft-core denigration of the Holocaust". [30] In April 2015, Steven A. Cook, the Hasib J. Sabbagh senior fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, criticized Roth for his tweets critical of Israel, which sent humanitarian aid to Nepal during the April 2015 Nepal earthquake. Roth tweeted, "Easier to address a far-away humanitarian disaster than the nearby one of Israel's making in Gaza. End the blockade!" [31] In a 2017 opinion for The Forward , Daniel Kohn claimed that Roth had established a Middle East/North Africa (MENA) team composed of what he termed anti-Israel activists. [32] In 2020, the Algemeiner Journal wrote, "Roth has long been noted for his hatred of Israel and his use of antisemitic rhetoric to attack it." [33]
In 2021, Roth tweeted: "Antisemitism is always wrong, and it long preceded the creation of Israel, but the surge in UK antisemitic incidents during the recent Gaza conflict gives the lie to those who pretend that the Israeli government's conduct doesn't affect antisemitism." American Jewish Committee director David Harris responded: "No, antisemitism is always wrong, period. Just as racism is always wrong, period. Coming from an alleged human rights defender, totally & utterly despicable". [34] The Anti-Defamation League said: "blaming Israel for the recent rise in violent antisemitic incidents, instead of blaming the antisemitic actors themselves, is plainly false and offensive" [35] The Community Security Trust said: "Kenneth Roth's tweet is a typical example of how Israel, Jews and antisemitism appear to be treated differently to other types of racism". After the backlash, Roth deleted his post, tweeting, "I deleted an earlier tweet because people misinterpreted its wording", [36] but did not apologize, writing, "Interesting how many people pretend that this tweet justifies antisemitism (it doesn't and I don't under any circumstances), rather than address the correlation…between recent Israeli government conduct in Gaza and the rise of UK antisemitic incidents." [37]
In 2021, Roth was offered a fellowship at the Harvard Kennedy School's Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. The offer was withdrawn in 2023. Roth said that the withdrawal was because of his criticism of Israel. [38] Michael Massing reported Roth's claims in the Nation . [39] Roth told the Guardian and Amy Goodman on Democracy Now that he believed Harvard Kennedy School dean Douglas Elmendorf had capitulated to Harvard's donors who are strong supporters of Israel. Kennedy school professor Kathryn Sikkink said she was told that Elmendorf thought Human Rights Watch has an "anti-Israel bias" and that Roth’s tweets on Israel were concerning, points she disputed with the dean. [39] [40] [41] Following Roth's complaint, the ACLU, Pen America, and other human rights activists condemned the Kennedy School's decision. [42] On January 10, 2023, HRW published a letter to Harvard President Lawrence Bacow that said it was concerned about a "lasting impact on scholars and activists, particularly Palestinians, who should not have to fear professional repercussions from Harvard University or another institution if they write or speak critically about the Israeli government". [43] Following those reports, hundreds of Harvard affiliates called on Elmendorf to resign. [44]
On January 19, 2023, The Kennedy School, which denies Roth's allegations, [45] reversed its decision, reoffering Roth the fellowship. [46] Elmendorf said that his initial decision had been in "error" and was not intended "to limit debate at the Kennedy School about human rights in any country". [47] Roth responded that Elmendorf failed to say anything to identify the people "who matter to him" who he said were behind his original veto decision. "Full transparency is key to ensuring that such influence is not exerted in other cases", Roth said, adding: "Secondly, I remain worried about academic freedom. Given my three decades leading Human Rights Watch, I was able to shine an intense spotlight on Dean Elmendorf’s decision, but what about others? The problem of people penalized for criticizing Israel is not limited to me." [48]
In the fall of 2023, Roth joined the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs as a lecturer and the Charles and Marie Robertson Visiting Professor. [49]
In 2010, Fred Oluoch-Ojiwah of Rwanda's New Times questioned Roth's impartiality and equated Roth's criticism of Rwanda's human rights record to a "love affair" with the "genocidaires" that carried out the Rwandan Genocide of 1994. [50]
In a later article, Oluoch-Ojiwah wrote: "As a western human rights personality [Roth]... will always fail to understand the intricacies and complexities surrounding the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi. Wrapping it up simplistically the way he has done will only serve to undo the gains already registered in driving the very delicate process of bringing forth a new dispensation in Rwanda and by extension the African Great Lakes region." [51]
In 2013, HRW accepted a $487,000 gift from Saudi billionaire Mohamed Bin Issa Al Jaber. The donation was solicited and managed by Roth. The donor had been the subject of HRW investigation up through 2012 for coercive business practices. Roth agreed to the Saudi demand that HRW not use this donation to support LGBT rights advocacy in the Middle East and North Africa. [52]
In 2020, HRW returned the donation to the Saudi billionaire. [52] Acceptance of this donation by Roth led to internal disputes over whether this violated HRW ethics policies and over Roth's decision-making, though it did not affect Roth's status at HRW. [52]
In 2014, the Egyptian government blocked Roth from entering the country. [53] He was traveling to Egypt to release a report on its government's August 2013 Rabaa massacre [54] of 817 sit-in protesters. [55]
In December 2019, China announced unspecified sanctions against HRW and several other NGOs because of links to the Hong Kong democracy movement. [56] In January 2020, Roth said that he was denied entry to Hong Kong. [57] He was planning to launch the organization's World Report, [58] which had an essay saying China is a growing threat to human rights around the world. [59] Geng Shuang, a spokesman for China's foreign ministry, told reporters he would not read the report, accusing Human Rights Watch of distorting the truth and claiming China's human rights situation is “the best it's been in history.” [60] In August 2020, the Chinese government announced that it had imposed unspecified “sanctions” on Roth. [61]
Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization headquartered in New York City that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policymakers, companies, and individual human rights abusers to denounce abuse and respect human rights, and often works on behalf of refugees, children, migrants, and political prisoners.
Issues relating to the State of Israel and aspects of the Arab–Israeli conflict and more recently the Iran–Israel conflict occupy repeated annual debate times, resolutions and resources at the United Nations. Since its founding in 1948, the United Nations Security Council, has adopted 79 resolutions directly related to the Arab–Israeli conflict as of January 2010.
Richard Joseph Goldstone is a South African retired judge who served in the Constitutional Court of South Africa from July 1994 to October 2003. He joined the bench as a judge of the Supreme Court of South Africa, first in the Transvaal Provincial Division from 1980 to 1989 and then in the Appellate Division from 1990 to 1994. Before that, he was a commercial lawyer in Johannesburg, where he entered legal practice in 1963 and took silk in 1976.
Israel's policies and actions in its ongoing occupation of the Palestinian territories have drawn accusations that it is committing the crime of apartheid. Leading Palestinian, Israeli and international human rights groups have said that the totality and severity of the human rights violations against the Palestinian population in the occupied territories, and by some in Israel proper, amount to the crime against humanity of apartheid. Israel and some of its Western allies have rejected the accusation, with the former often labeling the charge antisemitic.
Marc Garlasco is an American military advisor for the Dutch non-governmental organization PAX. Early in his career, Garlasco served for seven years at the Pentagon, as a mid-level intelligence analyst, later becoming chief of high-value targeting. Garlasco left in 2003 and joined Human Rights Watch (HRW) as a senior military expert, where he investigated human rights issues in a number of different conflicts zones. He resigned from HRW in February 2010 and has since worked as a specialist on civilian protection, war crimes investigations, identification of weapons and civilian harm mitigation for – among others – the United Nations, the Center for Naval Analysis (CNA), the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), before starting at PAX in 2020. Garlasco lives in New York.
UN Watch is a Geneva-based non-governmental organization (NGO) whose stated mission is "to monitor the performance of the United Nations by the yardstick of its own Charter". It is an accredited NGO in Special Consultative Status to the UN Economic and Social Council and an Associate NGO to the UN Department of Public Information.
Richard Anderson Falk is an American professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, and Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor's Chairman of the Board of Trustees. In 2004, he was listed as the author or coauthor of 20 books and the editor or coeditor of another 20 volumes. Falk has published extensively with multiple books written about international law and the United Nations.
The international non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) has been the subject of extensive criticism from a number of observers. Critics of HRW include the national governments it has investigated, the media, and its former chairman Robert L. Bernstein.
Abraham (Avi) Bell is an Israeli Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law and at Bar-Ilan University's Faculty of Law.
Douglas William Elmendorf is an American economist who is the dean and Don K. Price Professor of Public Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. He previously served as the Director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) from 2009 to 2015. He was a Brookings Institution senior fellow from 2007 to 2009, and briefly in 2015 following his time at the CBO, and was a director of the Hamilton Project at Brookings.
Accusations of violations regarding international humanitarian law, which governs the actions by belligerents during an armed conflict, have been directed at both Israel and Hamas for their actions during the 2008–2009 Gaza War. The accusations covered violating laws governing distinction and proportionality by Israel, the indiscriminate firing of rockets at civilian locations and extrajudicial violence within the Gaza Strip by Hamas. As of September 2009, some 360 complaints had been filed by individuals and NGOs at the prosecutor's office in the Hague calling for investigations into alleged crimes committed by Israel during the Gaza War.
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The United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, also known as the Goldstone Report, was a United Nations fact-finding mission established in April 2009 pursuant to Resolution A/HRC/RES/S-9/1 of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) of 12 January 2009, following the Gaza War as an independent international fact-finding mission "to investigate all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law by the occupying Power, Israel, against the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, particularly in the occupied Gaza Strip, due to the current aggression". South African jurist Richard Goldstone was appointed to head the mission. The other co-authors of the Report were Hina Jilani, Christine Chinkin and Desmond Travers.
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Antisemitism in Turkey refers to acts of hostility against Jews in the Republic of Turkey, as well as the promotion of antisemitic views and beliefs in Turkey.
The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law (LDB) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded by Kenneth L. Marcus in 2012 to advance the civil and human rights of the Jewish people and promote justice for all. LDB is active on American campuses, where it, according to the organization, combats antisemitism and anti-Zionism.
Gerald M. Steinberg, a professor of politics at Bar Ilan University, is an Israeli academic, political scientist, and political activist. He is founder and president of NGO Monitor, a policy analysis think tank focusing on non-governmental organizations.
Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) is a British non-governmental organisation established in August 2014 by members of the Anglo-Jewish community. It publishes research, organises rallies and petitions, and conducts litigation.
The working definition of antisemitism, also called the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism or IHRA definition, is a non-legally binding statement on what antisemitism is, that reads: "Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities." Accompanying the working definition, but of disputed status, are 11 illustrative examples whose purpose is described as guiding the IHRA in its work, seven of which relate to criticism of the Israeli government. As such, pro-Israeli organizations have been advocates for the worldwide legal adoption of the definition.
Francesca P. Albanese is an Italian international lawyer and academic. On 1 May 2022, she was appointed United Nations Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories for a three-year term. She is the first woman to hold the position.
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