continued from page 6
journey. Ells and I both looked forward to
those visits joyfully, knowing relief always
entered our home when they did, helping
us to look into our own strengths and to
talk about those end-of-life issues we may
have feared.
It was Natalie, with her quiet strength
and endless resources, who helped guide us
to our many care options or was just there
as a friend and listening ear.
It is difficult for me to put into words
what those last final months were like,
for me and my best friend and mate of 57
years. Just in reflection, I know that beauty
was all around us, and we could peacefully
reach for what lay ahead.
It was truly Life-Links and Jewish
Hospice that gave me the strength to offer
Ells whatever he needed, for both of us to
feel unafraid and safe. It was in that harmo-
ny that we faced his ending together.
Ellsworth left us quietly and gently late
the night of Nov.17, surrounded by his
children and grandchildren and me, in
the bedroom we had always shared, in the
home so filled with love and laughter.
We are so blessed in the Detroit commu-
nity to have the remarkable resource of a
dedicated Life-Links and Jewish Hospice.
I learned, gratefully, to reach out for them
early on our path. Do not be afraid to make
that first call.
Janet Birnkrant Levine lives in Huntington Woods.
If you’re facing end-of life care, reach out to Jewish
Hospice and Chaplaincy at jewishhospice.org.
8 | MARCH 18 • 2021
PURELY COMMENTARY
T
he announcement by the prosecu-
tor of the International Criminal
Court that she was opening inves-
tigations against Israel for alleged war
crimes should not have been
a surprise. This was the cul-
mination of a 20-year polit-
ical campaign that began
even before the ICC opened
its doors in The Hague in
2002.
The strategy was launched
during the NGO Forum
of the 2001 U.N. Durban
conference, in which 5,000 delegates con-
demned the “Israeli systematic perpetra-
tion of racist crimes, including war crimes,
acts of genocide and ethnic cleansing.”
At the time, the Israeli government did
not take this threat seriously. The ICC was
still a vague framework, and Israel, like
the United States, Russia and China, was
not a member. In addition, the Palestinian
Authority was not a state and did not have
the standing to initiate a complaint.
But this network of NGOs, in coop-
eration with the Palestinian leadership,
pursued an ICC investigation — known
as lawfare — with great intensity, spend-
ing tens of millions of euros, pounds and
krona. Human Rights Watch played a
central role from the beginning, joined
by Amnesty International, numerous
Palestinian NGOs with ties to the PLO and
PFLP terrorist groups and a number of
Israeli groups claiming to promote human
rights.
European governments provided much
of the NGO funding for this campaign:
Switzerland, Holland, Sweden, Denmark,
the Netherlands, Germany, the European
Union, Ireland and others.
It was only after the U.N. Human Rights
Council’s 2009 Goldstone Report on
Gaza repeated the NGOs’ accusations and
threatened a referral to the ICC that the
Israeli government began paying attention
to this campaign.
Supported by the NGO network,
Palestinians gained U.N. General
Assembly approval for calling themselves
a state in 2014, despite the absence of the
necessary criteria (such as a government
in total control of a defined territory), and
immediately used this dubious achieve-
ment to join the ICC and file complaints
against Israel.
In 2015, ICC prosecutor Fatou
Bensouda announced that she would con-
sider jurisdiction and in December 2019,
Bensouda claimed jurisdiction and “a
reasonable basis” for investigating possible
Israeli war crimes, and last month, after
two of the three judges who reviewed her
claims declared their approval, she moved
quickly to open a formal investigation.
Major damage in the form of demoni-
zation of Israel has already been done, but
if enough counter-pressure can be applied,
including by negating the power and
resources of the NGOs behind this process,
the ICC travesty might be stopped. The
current prosecutor is finishing her term,
and her successor, Karim Khan, from the
United Kingdom, might be persuaded to
halt the pseudo-investigations, particularly
if the survival of the ICC is at stake.
In parallel, European funders of the
campaign must be confronted directly
and consistently. Anyone who is con-
cerned about the abuse of the ICC for
political campaigns, including Americans
and Israelis, should demand to end the
demonization under the facade of human
rights and international law. Germany, for
instance, is one of the main funders of the
ICC and the largest single supporter of the
NGOs leading the campaigns. The absur-
dity of German funding for anti-Israel
NGOs has not yet received the necessary
priority.
September 2021 will mark the 20th
anniversary of the U.N.’s antisemitic
Durban conference and the NGO Forum,
where both ICC lawfare and the BDS cam-
paigns against Israel were launched. The
best way to mark this date is to ensure that
the perpetrators and their allies have noth-
ing to celebrate.
Gerald M. Steinberg is a professor of political
science at Bar-Ilan University and president of the
Institute for NGO Research.
essay
From Durban to The Hague
— 20 Years of NGO Lawfare
Gerald M.
Steinberg
JNS/Israel
Hayom