Israel 'personally attacking human rights group' after Gaza war criticism

America's leading human rights organization has accused Israel and its supporters of an "organized campaign" of false allegations and misinformation, including "extremely personal attacks" on its staff, in an attempt to discredit the group over its reports of war crimes in Gaza. Human Rights Watch (HRW) ties the campaign–which has included accusations that the group's reports on the Jewish state are written by "anti-Israel ideologues" and that it has sought funds from Saudi Arabia–to a statement by a senior official in the Israeli prime minister's office in June pledging to "dedicate time and manpower to combating" human rights organizations. The criticism began with Israeli pressure groups and rightwing blogs, but in recent weeks it has drawn the support of influential individuals such as Elie Wiesel, the Holocaust survivor and Nobel peace prize winner, and HRW's own founder, Robert Bernstein, who said the organization's reports were "helping those who wish to turn Israel into a pariah state". He called on HRW to focus more on abuses by Arab governments. Iain Levine, HRW's program director, said that while the organization had long attracted criticism, in recent months there had been significant attempts to intimidate and discredit it. "I really hesitate to use words like conspiracy, but there is a feeling that there is an organized campaign, and we're seeing from different places what would appear to be coordinated attacks ... from some of the language and arguments used it would seem as if there has been discussion," he said."We are having to spend a lot of time repudiating the lies, the falsehoods, the misinformation."