Amnesty Right-Washes Israeli Crimes Again

By Ingrid Chahine – Oct 2, 2025

Amnesty International released a statement Tuesday morning, calling on Palestinian factions to “immediately and unconditionally release all civilians held hostages in the occupied Gaza Strip”.

The timing of the Amnesty statement – two years into a genocidal war on the Strip – is neither neutral nor accidental. It also coincides with President Donald Trump’s deal for “peace” in Gaza, and all the regional and international pressure exerted on Hamas to settle.

An “investigation” by The Free Press recently highlighted internal divisions within the organisation with staff and directors debating whether a report on October 7 would be used politically to overshadow Israel’s ongoing crimes. Sources within the organization spoke of delays, debates, and the kind of institutional hesitation that can often arise when donors and/or lobbyists loom in the background.

The organization released a statement that addresses October 7th and “Hamas’s abuses” in a language that closely mirrors Israeli narratives, to a point where reaffirming genocide charges loses what remains of its meaning. Stating that this is a genocide two years later is not evidence of integrity, but of “PR politics”.

Consequently, the pressure exerted from the zionist lobby on one side, and the rightful internal resistance on the other, have led to the creation of a “both sides” narrative that shields the organization from criticism and sidelining, while allowing it to still ride the humanitarian wave.

Distorted language and biased allegations
A closer reading of Amnesty’s statement reveals the lopsided framing of events, thus reproducing Israeli discourse. The opening paragraphs start with the so-called hostages, briefly mention the systematic killing and starvation of Palestinians, then circle back to the “heightened fears over the fate” of the Israeli “civilians” who are still in the Strip. The statement provides extensive and intimate descriptions of “the last remaining of the 251 people – mostly citizens – who were seized”. Amnesty also relies heavily on Israeli data. The organization cites Haaretz’s database on hostages with no independent verification, and repeats the unproven allegations of sexual violence, despite the fact that the Zionist entity has a documented history of fabricating such claims for propaganda purposes.

The violence was ignored by mainstream media, underscoring the politics that shape the humanitarian sector and the behavior of its actors: Palestinians are silenced, marginalised and policed, while international organizations and NGOs in general posture as saviors and even guardians of human rights, but only in contexts that do not challenge Israel and its allies.

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Meanwhile, Palestinian prisoners are reduced to a side note. Amnesty itself addressed the increased use of unlawful administrative detention by Israeli forces as well as the enforced disappearance policy or incommunicado detention. Citing the NGO Hamoked in a 2024 publication, the organization published “some 5,262 Palestinians were held without charge or trial at the end of the year: 3,376 under administrative detention orders and 1,886 under the Unlawful Combatants Law”. Still, recent numbers are even more alarming. According to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society, more than 19,000 Palestinians have been detained in the West Bank and Jerusalem since October 2023. From Gaza, numbers remain deliberately obscured with only 2,662 detainees officially acknowledged as “unlawful combatants” – a fraction of the actual number. At least 77 Palestinians have died in Israeli custody since October 2023, including 46 from Gaza.

This is how Amnesty reproduces the asymmetry of global discourse: mourning individual Israeli lives while Palestinians are reduced to approximate numbers and statistics.

Vienna protests: pro-Palestinian students assaulted and threatened
Amnesty’s hypocrisy is not only in statements. On August 5,students organized a protest in Vienna, against what they described to as the “opportunism and complicity” of Western non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and political parties in Israel’s ongoing genocide. According to the organizers, who spoke to Al-Akhbar on condition of anonymity, members of Amnesty Austria, the anti-genocide Jewish organization Standing Together, and the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ) assaulted demonstrators. Protesters even reported physical assaults, threats, and cases of sexual harassment by individuals affiliated with these groups.

The same organization that campaigns for freedom of expression and peaceful assembly was involved – whether directly or indirectly – in suppressing Palestinian solidarity activists. The violence was ignored by mainstream media, underscoring the politics that shape the humanitarian sector and the behavior of its actors: Palestinians are silenced, marginalised and policed, while international organizations and NGOs in general posture as saviors and even guardians of human rights, but only in contexts that do not challenge Israel and its allies.

The release of this statement following Trump’s announcements and a few days before October 7, 2025 is not only an example of how International “humanitarian” organizations bend under Zionist pressure. It is also about sanitizing settler colonialism, forced displacement, mass killing, and collective punishment, through a so-called “balanced” framing of atrocities. The whole humanitarian sector has been benefiting from the “October 7 Industry”. For instance, Human Rights Watch (HRW) released its own heavily publicized report, feeding into the dominant narrative that fixates on “Israeli suffering” while disregarding and/or delaying the acknowledgment of the genocide, the occupation, and the endless atrocities committed by the zionist entity and its settlers. It is a way to contextualize, hedge, and sanitize Israeli crimes, ensuring every act of resistance is spotlighted in full exaggerated, misleading and demonized detail.

(al-akhbar)