Shurat HaDin

Shurat HaDin (Israel Law Center) is an Israeli NGO specializing in lawfare, i.e., using court -- especially in the US -- to harass critics/opponents of Israel.

Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer, summarizes Shurat HaDin's activities:
 * Recently, Shurat HaDin has been threatening to use litigation on American university campuses. Its website explains that “the Law Center, through its American office, has begun to monitor the rampant anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism in colleges and universities. It has informed the presidents of academic institutions that their schools could face civil and criminal liability for tolerating ‘an environment of intimidation and hostility’ that fails to protect Jewish and Israeli students against anti-Semitic harassment." Shurat HaDin, though an Israeli nongovernmental organization, is particularly active in the United States, exploiting the fact that American courts have proven willing to hear lawsuits directed against any terrorist group anywhere in the world even if no U.S. citizens are involved based on the principle that terrorism is an international crime. Existing terrorism legislation in the U.S. making it illegal to provide “material support” to any group designated as terrorist is itself lawfare, using deliberately vague language to justify nearly anything if a terrorist group is in any way involved or can plausibly be implicated. The law itself provides an elastic framework for litigation. Shurat HaDin’s intention is to silence any and all criticism of Israel, and, to do so, it works assiduously to connect governments and organizations to proscribed terrorist entities so they can be sued for damages. The intention is to use the legal weapon to tie up opponents. Many of the Shurat HaDin charges have proven to be frivolous, but those who are sued have to waste time and resources defending themselves, which is precisely what is intended. For example, in January 2012, Shurat HaDin warned the landlord of the Palestine Liberation Organization in Washington and the Verizon telephone company that providing premises and services to the PLO was illegal and could lead to criminal prosecution. More recently, in April, Shurat HaDin advised the Israeli government that the so-called flytilla activists who intended to “fly-in” to Israel for a nonviolent protest should be arrested and prosecuted "to deter participants ... from taking part in future ‘flytillas.’” This is precisely what the Israeli government subsequently did.

Principals

 * Nitsana Darshan-Leitner – Director

Contact

 * Website: www.israellawcenter.org