HRW staff resign over blocked report labeling Israel’s denial of Palestinian right of return a “crime against humanity”

Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch’s Israel-Palestine director, and assistant researcher Milena Ansari have resigned in protest after the organization withheld a report they authored that characterizes Israel’s denial of the Palestinian right of return as a “crime against humanity.” According to a report by Jewish Currents on Tuesday, Shakir stated in his resignation letter that HRW leadership’s decision departed from standard review processes and reflected “fear of political backlash rather than legal or factual concerns.”

Content and Scope of the Blocked Report

The unpublished 33-page report documented the experiences of Palestinians displaced from Gaza, the West Bank, and refugee communities in Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria, linking decades of denied return to prosecutable crimes under international law. HRW leadership claimed the report raised “complex and consequential issues” requiring further analysis, but Shakir countered that the document had undergone seven months of internal review and had been signed off by multiple divisions, specialists, and legal offices before being blocked.

Internal Protest and Credibility Concerns

Shakir and Ansari argued that attempts to narrow the report’s scope to recent displacements would undermine its legal foundation and silence the voices of generations of refugees. Over 200 HRW staff members reportedly protested the delay, warning that it could damage the organization’s credibility. The resignations come as HRW’s new executive director, Philippe Bolopion, begins his term amid heightened scrutiny of the organization’s work on Israel and Palestine.