Omar Shakir, who has led HRW’s operations in Israel since October 2016, is set to be expelled from Israel Monday over his support for the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
Earlier this month, the Israeli Supreme Court upheld a lower court’s decision permitting the Interior Ministry to deny Shakir’s request for extensions to his residency and work visas.
Human Rights Watch had denied that either it or Shakir had endorsed the BDS movement, though the Jerusalem District Court accept the government’s claims that Shakir had in fact worked to promote the BDS movement’s agenda. Human Rights Watch has in the past urged companies not to do business with Israeli corporations which operate in Judea and Samaria, saying that to do so would make them complicit in human rights abuses.