By 2012, Shurat HaDin had eleven employees.[9] It retains two public relations firms, one in Israel and one in New York.[10]
As of 2015, the annual budget was $2.5 million, though Shurat HaDin does not disclose its donors.[11] According to an In These Times review in 2019, donations to the organizations include $1.1 million from U.S. foundations and charities over the last decade. Prominent donors are the John Hagee Ministries, run by Christian ZionistJohn Hagee, which has donated at least $225,000; the Jewish Federation of Greater Houston, which has given $475,000; and the Michael and Andrea Leven Family Foundation , which has given $25,000.[12]
Israeli government ties
Shurat HaDin works closely with the Israeli government and the Israeli intelligence community.
According to a leaked U.S. diplomatic cable, Darshan-Leitner told U.S. officials in 2007 that "in its early years" Shurat HaDin "took direction from the GOI [Government of Israel] on which cases to pursue" and that it received evidence from Israeli government officials. The cable quoted Darshan-Leitner directly: "The [Israeli] National Security Council (NSC) legal office saw the use of civil courts as a way to do things that they are not authorized to do."[13] She later denied ever saying that to a U.S. diplomat.[14]
In an interview in 2014, Darshan-Leitner told a Swedish pro-Israel nonprofit that "governments cannot do what we do", citing "political restraints" and "international treaties".[13]
In a 2017 book entitled Harpoon after Mossad's finance-tracking unit, Darshan-Leitner described her cooperation with the intelligence agency.[15] She wrote that Mossad operatives held regular briefings with her and would tip her off on suspect financing for her to file lawsuits against. In some cases, the Israeli government provided written affidavits to back up claims.[16][15] She claimed that her role in the operation was voluntary and unpaid.[15] Two of the cases she credited the cooperation for was the lawsuit against the Palestinian Authority in 2015 and the legal complaints that led to the disbanding of a planned 2011 Gaza flotilla.[15] Israel's military censors had to redact a fifth of the text according to Darshan-Leitner.[15]
Shurat HaDin has filed a large number of lawsuits and legal complaints.
The twelve missing Iranian Jews (2006)
In 1994, twelve Iranian Jews disappeared as they, aided by Mossad and the Jewish Agency, attempted to escape the country to Israel.[18] In 2006 Shurat HaDin sued former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami on behalf of their families as they thought they had been wrongfully imprisoned when he was president.[19] However, in 2014 it was found that the majority of the Jews had been killed by Iranian security forces who believed them to be members of the dissident group People's Mujahedin of Iran. The others had been killed by members of their local tribe for unspecified reasons.[18]
American Express Bank and Lebanese-Canadian Bank (2008)
In 2008, Shurat HaDin and Attorney Robert Tolchin of New York filed suit against American Express Bank (Amex) in the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan accusing the bank of facilitating transfer of money to Hezbollah.
Representing some 85 victims and their family members, the Shurat HaDin lawsuit alleged that the Amex and the Lebanese Canadian Bank (LCB) illegally transferred millions of dollars in wire transfers to Hezbollah between 2004 and 2006.[20]
The group alleges that UBS was involved in transferring dollars to regimes such as Iran, Cuba, and North Korea. The UBS operation was uncovered by American soldiers in Iraq in 2003 who discovered brand new dollars, still wrapped in Federal Reserve casings behind a wall in Saddam Hussein's palace.[22] A Federal Reserve investigation of the currency determined that UBS was responsible for illegally transferring between $4 and $5 billion to states designated by the U.S. as sponsors of terrorism between 1996 and 2004.[22] At first UBS sought to deny the extent of the money transfers it had provided to Iran and others, but eventually was compelled to admit the scope of its criminal activities.[22] UBS, one of world's wealthiest banks, was fined $100 million by the Federal Reserve for its conduct.[22]
North Korea abduction case (2009)
In 2000 Kim Dong-shik, a South Korean pastor, was abducted in northeastern China and has not been heard from since.[23] In 2009 Shurat HaDin, to help Kim's son and brother, both U.S. citizens, brought a lawsuit against North Korea in a U.S. federal court, seeking damages for Kim's torture and murder because the country was suspected to be behind the abduction.[24] In 2015 the court ordered North Korea to pay $300 million in punitive damages and $15 million each to Kim's brother and his son.[23] According to Darshan-Leitner, this was the first time a US court has found that a foreign regime which abducts an individual who is then never heard from again, has the burden of proving that he has not been murdered.[23]
Gaza flotilla (2011)
Shurat Hadin used lawfare to threaten lawsuits against parties associated with the Gaza Flotilla.[25]
Jimmy Carter (2011)
In 2011 Shurat HaDin, representing five plaintiffs,[26] sued former President Jimmy Carter and publisher Simon & Schuster over the publication of Carter's book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.[27] It claimed that Carter and his publisher engaged in "deceptive acts in the course of conducting business" and Darshan-Leitner claimed that Carter's "hatred of Israel has led him to commit this fraud on the public."[26] Shurat HaDin sought $5 million in damages.[26]
I would hope that both the left and the right could agree that using consumer-protection laws to sue authors and publishers who publish books with controversial theses is a very bad idea. Indeed, in a world full of Glenn Becks and Pat Buchanans, it is revealing that this is the first lawsuit of its kind (a point of pride, scarily enough, for the plaintiffs' lawyers). But, of course, this is a book about Israel — and this lawsuit is simply a new front in the never-ending war against anyone who has the temerity to criticize Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. The goal of the lawsuit isn't to force Simon & Schuster to pay damages for publishing Carter's book; its goal is to bully Carter and other would-be critics of Israel into not writing books like Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid in the first place.
The plaintiffs dropped the suit after a few months.[28]
Iran and Syria lawsuit (2012)
In 2006 Daniel Wultz, a 16-year-old American, was killed in a suicide attackin a Tel Aviv restaurant. Islamic Jihad, based in Damascus, Syria, took responsibility.[30] Shurat HaDin brought a lawsuit on behalf of the family against Syria and Iran which it argued were responsible. In 2012 the court sided with the plaintiff and awarded the family a $323 million judgement.[30]
World Vision Australia (2012)
In 2012 Shurat HaDin sent a letter to the Christian relief, development, and advocacy group World Vision Australia (WV) and the Australian government's international aid agency AusAID, asserting that the groups' funding of the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC), a Gaza-based Palestinian nonprofit group, could make WV and AusAID "personally, criminally and civilly liable under Australian and US law."[31][32] Shurat HaDin alleged that UAWC was a front group for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a proscribed terrorist organization,[31][32] and asserted that by providing aid to the UAWC, WV and AusAID were "aiding and abetting Palestinian terrorism, and thereby violating Australian and United States anti-terrorism laws."[32] WV suspended its work with UAWC pending an outcome of the investigation,[31][32] and resumed working with UAWC after AusAID and WV determined that the allegations were unfounded.[33]
An investigation conducted by AusAID in conjunction with the Australian Federal Police and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, found no evidence to substantiate Shurat HaDin's claims of a link between UAWC and PFLP.[34][35] In an October 2012 letter to Shurat ha-Din, World Vision Australia CEO Tim Costello said that the allegations made by Shurat HaDin were "unsubstantiated, and in some circumstances, defamatory".[36]
Shurat HaDin v. Lynch (2013)
In 2012 Dan Avnon, a political theorist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, applied for fellowship at Sydney University and asked Jake Lynch at Sydney to endorse his application. Lynch refused, citing his leadership with the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, his support for the BDS movement, the fact that the Hebrew University has a campus in the West Bank and ties to the Israeli military.[37] In 2013 Shurat HaDin sued Lynch for violating Australia's anti-racism laws and attempted to use the suit to outlaw BDS in Australia. The Executive Council of Australian Jewry publicly denounced the suit as an inappropriate use of the courts.[38][39]
In April 2014 the court struck part of the suit, and Shurat HaDin lawyers narrowed the complaint to the specifics of Avnon and Lynch.[40] But Avnon made known that he did not support the suit. In July 2014, noting that Shurat HaDin did not represent a willing client and did not have a complaint of its own, the court dismissed the case and awarded attorney fees to Lynch.[41] Shurat HaDin said that "the case was thrown out on a technicality, not on the merits of the arguments ... [Lynch's] lawyers came up with a trick to avoid the issue being heard on its merits." Shurat HaDin's spokesperson said the suit was a warning to other Australian academic institutions.[41]
Presbyterian Church USA (2014)
In June 2014 the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) passed a resolution calling for divestment from U.S. companies with business interests in Israel. Altogether approximately $21 million worth of shares was divested from Hewlett Packard, Caterpillar and Motorola Solutions. Consequently, Shurat HaDin filed a complaint with the IRS arguing that PCUSA's tax-exempt status should be revoked. Shurat HaDin also claimed that it had evidence of PCUSA delegates meeting with Hezbollah and distributing anti-Semitic and anti-Israel materials.[42]
Coca-cola threat (2015)
In 2015 Shurat HaDin called on Coca-Cola to drop its Palestinian franchise because its head, Zahi Khouri, was endorsing the BDS movement. It advised Coca-Cola not to associate with any entity advocating for boycotts of Israel. Shurat HaDin warned that legal action could be taken to "ensure that The Coca-Cola Company is not engaged in instituting, promoting or inciting boycotts."[43]
United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (2015)
Shurat HaDin is preparing to take the Palestinian Authority (PA) to the International Criminal Court (ICC). In the event that the Palestinian Authority is accepted into the ICC, it will enable the PA to become susceptible to lawsuits. Shurat HaDin is preparing in advance by collecting thousands of testimonies from Israeli victims of Palestinian attacks.[3]
Sokolow v. Palestine Liberation Organization (2015)
In December 2015, Shurat HaDin posted two racist Facebook pages, one anti-Israel and the other anti-Palestinian Arab in an effort to establish bias at Facebook; Facebook at first removed only the anti-Arab hate page, while maintaining that the overtly anti-Semitic anti-Israel page "met community standards", but later conceded that the pages were alike and also removed the anti-Israel hate page.[48]
The same year a class-action lawsuit, Lakin v. Facebook Inc.,[49] was filed on behalf of 20,000 Israelis[50] in the State of New York in October 2015; the plaintiffs alleged that Facebook had ignored incitement to violence by Palestinian users.[50][49] The suit was dismissed under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.[51] Nitsana Darshan-Leitner argued that by allowing Hamas, Hezbollah, PLO, and ISIS to use Facebook the social media giant is providing "material support" to those groups.[51]
Lorde concert cancellation (2018)
In January 2018, Shurat HaDin filed a lawsuit demanding NIS 15,000 to each of three teenagers (about $13,000[52]), Shoshana Steinbach, Ayelet Wertzel and Ahuva Frogel, against the New Zealand Palestinian solidarity activists Justine Sachs and Nadia Abu-Shanab for allegedly convincing the New Zealand singer Lorde to cancel her scheduled tour of Tel Aviv in mid-2018.[53] The lawsuit alleged that the cancellation had damaged the teenagers "artistic welfare" and that they had suffered "emotional" injury and "above all damage to their good name as Israelis and Jews."[53] The lawsuit was filed under the Israeli Law for Prevention of Damage to State of Israel through Boycott.[52] Sachs and Abu-Shanab had earlier penned an open letter on the New Zealand online current affairs magazine The Spinoff in December 2017 urging Lorde to cancel her Israel concert, citing human rights abuses against the Palestinians.[54] The letter read:[55]
Dear Lorde ... we're two young women based in Aotearoa, one Jewish, one Palestinian, ...
Today, millions of people stand opposed to the Israeli government's policies of oppression, ethnic cleansing, human rights violations, occupation and apartheid. As part of this struggle, we believe that an economic, intellectual and artistic boycott is an effective way of speaking out against these crimes. This worked very effectively against apartheid in South Africa, and we hope it can work again.
We can play an important role in challenging injustice today. We urge you to act in the spirit of progressive New Zealanders who came before you and continue their legacy.
In October 2018, the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs and ordered that the two New Zealand activists pay NIS 45,000 in damages to the plaintiffs, plus NIS 11,000 in legal fees (about $23,600[56]).[53] This is believed to be the first successful application of the 2011 law.[56]
The two activists stated that they had "no intention" of paying the teenagers, and launched a crowdfunding campaign in order to give the money to the Gaza Mental Health Foundation, and raised more than $18,000 in three days.[55] Darshan-Leitner said that legal agreements between Israel and New Zealand allowed her to enforce the ruling in New Zealand, and to "go after [the activists'] bank accounts until it has been fully realized."[55] Legal experts in New Zealand said that the lawsuit was an attempt to chill free speech and that attempts to enforce the judgement were unlikely to be successful.[57]
In November 2018 Airbnb announced that it would remove listings of properties owned by settlers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Israel's Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan called on affected settlers to sue Airbnb.[58] Shurat HaDin consequently sued Airbnb on behalf of a group of Israeli-American Jews owning properties in the West Bank.[59] In April 2019 Airbnb reversed its decision and would continue to allow listings from illegal Israeli settlements.[60]
Pro-Palestinian blogger Richard Silverstein states that Shurat Hadin files frivolous lawsuits designed to tie up resources and garner headlines, rather than to win a legal case or establish a precedent. The idea, he argues, is to force companies or institutions that Shurat Hadin thinks are acting in ways hostile to Israel's interests to spend enormous sum defending their position.[6] Liz Jackson, staff attorney at Palestine legal, argues along the same lines. In her view, Shurat HaDin files lawsuits it knows it will lose because the publicity allows it to smear human rights activists as terrorists. It is a "win-win strategy", she argues, because the organization is funded well enough that it can afford to lose.[63]
Related Research Articles
The Lod Airport massacre was a terrorist attack that occurred on 30 May 1972. Three members of the Japanese Red Army recruited by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – External Operations (PFLP-EO), attacked Lod Airport near Tel Aviv, killing 26 people and injuring 80 others. Two of the attackers were killed, while a third, Kōzō Okamoto, was captured after being wounded.
Francis Anthony Boyle is an American human rights lawyer and professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law. He has served as counsel for Bosnia and Herzegovina and has supported the rights of Palestinians and indigenous peoples.
Arab Bank is a Jordanian bank that is one of the largest financial institutions in the Middle East. It is Headquartered today in Amman, Jordan, and operates as a universal bank that serves clients in more than 600 branches spanning five continents. Arab Bank is a publicly held shareholding company listed on the Amman Stock Exchange.
Lawfare is the use of legal systems and institutions to damage or delegitimize an opponent, or to deter an individual's usage of their legal rights.
StandWithUs (SWU) is a nonprofit pro-Israel education and advocacy organization founded in Los Angeles in 2001 by Roz Rothstein, Jerry Rothstein, and Esther Renzer.
Nitsana Darshan-Leitner is an Israeli attorney, human rights activist, and the founder of Shurat HaDin – Israeli Law Center. As the president of the Shurat HaDin, she has represented hundreds of terror victims in legal actions against terror organizations and their supporters. Darshan-Leitner initiated a legal campaign to deprive terrorists of social media resources such as Facebook and Twitter. Darshan-Leitner assisted in blocking the Gaza Freedom Flotilla.
Psagot is an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, located on Tawil hill, adjacent to the Palestinian cities of Ramallah and al-Bireh. Established in 1981, it is organised as a community settlement and falls under the jurisdiction of Binyamin Regional Council, with the council's headquarters located there. In 2021 it had a population of 2,077.
The Ministry of Strategic Affairs and Public Diplomacy is an Israeli government ministry responsible for leading the campaign of expanding the Abraham Accords and the handling of ties on White House matters.
The Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC) is a Ramallah based Palestinian non-profit organization that was established in 1986 to improve the performance and professionalism of Palestinian farmers. The Union also aims to help Palestinian farmers market their produce and provides agricultural employment opportunities through a framework of cooperation with domestic, Arab, and international agricultural development institutions.
Law for Prevention of Damage to State of Israel through Boycott, also commonly known as the (Anti-) Boycott Law, is an Israeli anti-BDS law enacted in July 2011 and partially stricken down by the Supreme Court in 2015.
The Murder of Yaron and Efrat Ungar was a shooting attack on June 9, 1996, during which two Palestinian gunmen killed Yaron and Efrat Ungar as they drove on a road between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, Israel near Beit Shemesh. The Palestinian gunmen fired twenty bullets from their Mitsubishi van into the couple's car. Although the bullets missed the couple's one-year-old son, who was in a car seat in the back, both Yaron and Efrat were killed.
Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) is a nonviolent Palestinian-led movement promoting boycotts, divestments, and economic sanctions against Israel. Its objective is to pressure Israel to meet what the BDS movement describes as Israel's obligations under international law, defined as withdrawal from the occupied territories, removal of the separation barrier in the West Bank, full equality for Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel, and "respecting, protecting, and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties". The movement is organized and coordinated by the Palestinian BDS National Committee.
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.
Sokolow v. Palestine Liberation Organization was a civil case considered by US federal courts, against the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Palestinian Authority. The plaintiffs were US citizens injured in terrorist attacks in Israel and US citizens who are relatives of those who were killed by these attacks. They sued Palestine Liberation Organization and Palestinian Authority under the Antiterrorism Act of 1991, demanding $1 billion or more in damages. On 31 August 2016, the Second US Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan dismissed the lawsuit on the grounds that US federal courts lacked overseas jurisdiction on civil cases, and the 2nd Circuit decision was effectively upheld on appeal when the Supreme Court of the United States refused to hear an appeal of the Sokolow decision, sending the case back to the trial court for dismissal.
Micah Lakin Avni is an Israeli businessman, attorney and a human rights and anti-terrorism activist.
Jake Lynch is a journalist, academic and writer, and a scholarly authority within the fields of peace journalism and peace research. He is an academic with the University of Sydney, although for 2020 he is on secondment as a Leverhulme Visiting Professor at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations at Coventry University, UK.
The Palestinian NGOs Network is an umbrella organization of about 30 Palestinian non-government organisations (NGOs) in the Palestinian territories formed to enhance coordination, consultation and cooperation between member NGOs and to strengthen Palestinian civil society and contribute to the establishment of a Palestinian state. PNGO was formed in September 1993, and as of January 2020, had 135 member NGOs operating in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.
With regard to the Arab–Israeli conflict, many supporters of the State of Israel have often advocated or implemented anti-BDS laws, which effectively seek to retaliate against people and organizations engaged in boycotts of Israel-affiliated entities. Most organized boycotts of Israel have been led by Palestinians and other Arabs with support from much of the Muslim world. Since the Second Intifada in particular, these efforts have primarily been coordinated at an international level by the Palestinian-led BDS movement, which seeks to mount as much economic pressure on Israel as possible until the Israeli government allows an independent Palestinian state to be established. Anti-BDS laws are designed to make it difficult for anti-Israel people and organizations to participate in boycotts; anti-BDS legal resolutions are symbolic and non-binding parliamentary condemnations, either of boycotts of Israel or of the BDS movement itself. Generally, such condemnations accuse BDS of closeted antisemitism, charging it with pushing a double standard and lobbying for the de-legitimization of Israeli sovereignty, and are often followed by laws targeting boycotts of Israel.
The American Studies Association's boycott of Israel is an ongoing boycott of Israeli educational institutions by the American Studies Association (ASA). ASA's decision to begin boycotting Israel in December 2013 was controversial because it was the first major American scholarly organization to do so and it was heavily criticized. In April 2016, four ASA members aided by the pro-Israeli Brandeis Center sued ASA but the lawsuit was dismissed in 2019 when the judge ruled that plaintiffs lacked standing.
The US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), formerly known as the US Campaign to End Israeli Occupation, is a pro-Palestinian advocacy group advocating for the rights of Palestinians. The organization was founded in 2001 after the second Intifada and is now made up of more than 300 member groups in the US working for Palestinian advocacy. USCPR was created with the goal to focus on "denied human rights" instead of focusing explicitly on Palestinian statehood.
↑ Kane 2019: "They have a lot of resources, so they can throw a lot of spaghetti at the wall," says Liz Jackson, a senior staff attorney for Palestine Legal, which defends Palestine advocates' free speech rights and has defended those whom Shurat HaDin has targeted. "[They] paint anyone who's an advocate for human rights as a terrorist. ... It's a win-win strategy because they have enough money that they can afford to lose. And even when they lose a case, they get media."
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
