US: Obama Should Highlight Human Rights on Mideast Trip

Human Rights Watch urged Obama, the Illinois senator and US presidential candidate, to support a new approach to Israel, the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and Jordan by conditioning relevant portions of US financial aid on each government's compliance with international human rights law. Each has committed serious abuses of human rights that US government policies have insufficiently addressed.

"Senator Obama should signal to all parties in the region that, to avoid complicity, the US government will cut aid that is funding continuing breaches of international human rights law," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch.

Those abuses include the continued expansion of settlements in the West Bank and illegal blockade of the Gaza Strip by Israel, indiscriminate rocket fire at Israeli civilian areas by Gaza-based Palestinian groups, numerous instances of torture of prisoners by both Palestinian and Jordanian security forces, and significant new legal restrictions on independent nongovernmental organizations in Jordan.

While the current US administration has criticized many of these abuses, it has stopped short of taking significant measures to ensure they cease, said Human Rights Watch. The United States is the largest financial donor to all three parties.

In Israel, the US government has failed to deter the Israeli government from continuing and even accelerating construction of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which are widely recognized as illegal under international humanitarian law. Work has also continued on the "separation barrier" or wall deep inside the West Bank, endangering the basic rights of the Palestinian population, including access to their lands, services, medical care, water, and livelihoods.

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