Category: charities

Doctors Without Borders Accused of violating its own policy of political neutrality to impugn Israel, and my cessation of donations

July 21, 2024 • 9:40 am

A while back I was a big fan of Doctors without Borders (or “MSF”, for “Médecins Sans Frontières”).  It was put in my will to get a big bequest, and when I auctioned of a copy of Why Evolution is True, autographed by many famous scientists and nonbelievers, and illustrated and illuminated by Kelly Houle, every penny of the $10,000+ we got on eBay went to MSF.

Then I heard that the organization was anti-Israel (this was well before October 7 of last year). Checking up on the Internet, I found some confirmation of that claim, including several reports that MSF refused to cooperate with Israeli medical teams working in the same location. This, from the article below, may be what I remember (Rossin is named as “secretary general of MSF in the 1970s”)

Rossin recalled his experience in 2010 on a mission to Uganda when an MSF Holland contingent refused to interact with a fellow Israeli medical NGO team dispatched to help. Rossin remembered it as an episode of “one-way empathy,” where prejudice had poisoned the MSF team’s ability to cooperate with Israel in their shared goal of helping civilians.

(See also here, though MSF denies all these allegations.)

I subsequently wrote MSF asking them if they ever used Israeli doctors in their relief efforts.  I got no reply, even though in the letter I told them I was a donor. Their ignoring me after the dosh I’d given them was, well, uncharitable.

Now I can’t really criticize MSF’s humanitarian efforts: they’ve done a great deal of wonderful medical work during crises all over the world.  No, here I’m pointing out an article in Canada’s National Post that documents a pervasive anti-Israel—a former MSF secretary calls it “antisemitic”—attitude on the part of the organization, an attitude reflected in its refusal to criticize Hamas for the terrorist’s group own blocking or hijacking medical aid and turning Gaza hospitals into terror centers.  In the piece below, quite a few former directors and employees of MSF, not to mention donors, weigh in criticizing the organization on this account.

My own decision, based on what I’ve read over the years, is to stop donating to MSF, and I’ve taken them out of my will, replacing them with other humanitarian organizations (and that is a fair amount of dosh!).  Read the article below for yourself (click on the headline) and decide if you want to support them.  The article is free, and you can also find it archived here.

I’ll simply give a number of quotes from the article. According to its charter, MSF is supposed to be politically neutral and impartial, but former executives, donors, and employees say that when it comes to Israel, that’s not the case.

Former leaders and a major Canadian donor of Doctors Without Borders are distancing themselves from the venerable aid organization after its employees celebrated the October 7 atrocities, gave aid to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health, ran a one-sided social media feed and internally circulated articles accusing Israel of creating Palestinian “death worlds.”

“To be frank, I was very, very, surprised because it’s not the MSF I knew,” Alain Destexhe, the secretary general of the organization, popularly known by its French acronym MSF, from 1991 to 1995, told National Post.

Destexhe said MSF’s messaging throughout the Israel-Hamas war is markedly different than past conflicts.

“We used to make statements, you know, in Bosnia and Rwanda, but not taking sides like this,” he said. “We always took into account the political context, but not to take sides from one group to another. In the Gaza War, I really got the feeling that MSF was totally biased.”

From a donor:

Destexhe wasn’t the only MSF loyalist to have an October 7 wake-up call. One major Canadian Jewish donor told the Post he urged his mother to support the group despite pushback from family members cautioning him against MSF’s reputation of being institutionally biased against Israel.

“I think most people know that they have a history of not being the friendliest towards Israel,” the philanthropist, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told the Post.

He said he reassured his mother, following conversations with MSF Canada’s leadership, that the organization was duty-bound to be apolitical and strictly adhere to its mission of providing aid and observation. However, the inconsistencies between their initial promise and their treatment of Israel reached a boiling point in November 2023 when the patron confronted MSF Canada’s executives.

“I will be honest,” the donor told then-executive director Joe Belliveau in an email shared with the Post, “the more I review MSF public communications (Instagram, specifically), the evidence is overwhelming that the MSF stance has a pronounced bias. There is still not one single mention of the 200+ civilian hostages; not one mention of Hamas’ indiscriminate rocket fire into civilian centers, both of which are war crimes and violations of the Geneva conventions,” he wrote in late November.

. . . and a former MSF executive:

The donor’s November 2023 email rattled Byron Sonberg, who’d proudly served as MSF Canada’s treasurer for two years. He’d begun to sense the organization straying from its principle of impartiality, especially after he was copied on the donor’s email chain expressing growing frustration with the group. But the final straw came in mid-February 2024 when he, and hundreds of MSF global leaders, were forwarded an article: “Israeli necropolitics and the pursuit of health justice in Palestine.” [JAC: I found some of that article here; just read the “summary box”]

It was shared by Ruby Gill, president of MSF Canada’s board of directors, to provide “more insight” into the ongoing conflict. It argued that “framing Palestinian violence on October 7 as provocation and Israeli violence as response is ahistoric and indicates indifference to the everyday violence experienced by Palestinians.”

In other words, Israel “had it coming” on October 7. And the article was apparently sent out by MSF!  More:

Hamas receives a single passing reference in the piece, while Israel is cited nearly eighty times to bolster the claim that the Jewish State’s military response is unjustifiable. It accuses Israel of creating “death worlds” for Palestinians. The ideas expressed in the article, and the silence of MSF’s leadership, disturbed Sonberg, a self-described political moderate.

This concentration on Israel and complete neglect of Hamas is distressing in light of the fact that Hamas repeatedly impedes medical efforts in Gaza, including highjacking medical supplies, turning hospitals into terror bases, and even shooting Gazan civilians.

From another former MSM executive:

Richard Rossin, who served as secretary general of MSF in the 1970s and later co-founded Médecins du Monde (Doctors of the World), said that he perceived a tone shift within the organization several decades ago.

“I think it was perceptible around the beginning of the ‘80s,” Rossin told the Post by phone from his home in southern Israel. Antisemitism within MSF “began under the cover of anti-Zionism.”

See the quote from Rossin in the opening paragraphs.

One of the most distressing parts of this narrative is that MSF blamed Israel for the attack on the al-Ahli Hospital on October 17 of last year, an “attack” that did not involved Israel at all, but came from a misfired rocket from Palestinian Islamic Jihad that landed in the hospital’s parking lot, with the casualties greatly exaggerated by Hamas. MSF never retracted its accusation, which has been abandoned by everyone familiar with the evidence, including the Associated Press (no fan of Israel), which summarizes the evidence. (there’s also a telling conversation between two Hamas operatives saying the rocket was “from us).

By comparison, after the al-Ahli Hospital blast on Oct. 17, 2023, MSF rushed to blame Israel.

“We are horrified by the recent Israeli bombing of Ahli Arab Hospital in #Gaza City, which was treating patients and hosting displaced Gazans. Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed. This is a massacre. It is absolutely unacceptable,” MSF International wrote on X on the day of the explosion.

Although the blast was the result of a misfired rocket from Gaza, likely launched by a Palestinian group, MSF never corrected the record. The post, as well as several Instagram posts published by major chapters — including Spain, Canada, Brazil, and France – remain active. No apology or correction has been issued.

To a scientist, refusal to retract an accusation like this is shameful. But that’s MSF. Here’s their tweet, still up on X, but with “context corrections”:

More:

After Hamas invaded and killed over a thousand people, MSF did not release a single post addressing the worst killing of Jews since the Holocaust and it has not called for the return of kidnapped Israelis. Five days after the terrorist attack, the group issued a statement drawing a moral equivalence between Hamas and Israel. [JAC note: I think the link is meant to go to the MSF “X” feed, not to just one post.)

“We are horrified by the brutal mass killing of civilians perpetrated by Hamas, and by the massive attacks on #Gaza now being pursued by Israel,” MSF International wrote on Oct. 12. The remainder of the thread denounced Israel for “indiscriminate violence and the collective punishment of Gaza.” Two days later, the group called on Israel to “show humanity.”

The tone set by MSF International trickled down to its chapters across the globe.

By Oct. 17, MSF Canada wrote, “unconditional humanity needs to be restored in Gaza,” calling Israel’s response “unimaginable” and “inhumane.” The statement made no reference to Hamas or their invasion, which ignited hostilities.Before October 7, several nations facing humanitarian issues were highlighted in MSF Canada’s social feeds – including Malawi, Venezuela, Sudan, Haiti and Burkina Faso – but its coverage following the Hamas attack veered near-exclusively to covering Israel. At one point, in early November 2023, MSF Canada’s Instagram account was blanketed with six red-bolded calls for an immediate ceasefire, something not previously done as part of its advocacy for Sudan or Ukraine.

No calls on Hamas to “show humanity,” not just towards Israel but to civilian Gazans?

Despite the fact that the Gaza Ministry of Health, run by Hamas, is known to exaggerate death tolls, which have been revised strongly downward by even the UN, MSF continued to use them. Another comment from MSF’s former secretary-general:

MSF’s relationship with the Hamas-run Ministry of Health was another major reason why Destexhe lost faith. Their failure to admit “health facilities (are) being used by Hamas and by soldiers,” he told the Post, left him “really sad, and then I became angry.”

More:

MSF International’s Instagram page was comparatively muted in February 2022 following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, calling the situation “extremely worrying.” Within a month, the organization’s focus had quickly shifted to Libyan refugees, midwives in South Sudan, and social workers in the Palestinian Territories.

The messaging inequality was studied by Gerald Steinberg, founder and leader of NGO Monitor, a watchdog organization based in Jerusalem, who combed through MSF’s X feed. He found over a hundred tweets between the Hamas invasion and late November, “not one (solely) mentions Israeli victims.” There were five instances when Israelis were mentioned, but always alongside Palestinians.

Steinberg has grown accustomed to this discrepancy. “MSF is both a humanitarian and advocacy organization, and on Israel and the Palestinians, the partisan dimension is dominant and destructive,” Steinberg told the Post by email. He recalled the group showing similar favouritism during an earlier flare-up in 2009.

Finally, there are further claims in the article that a sizable percentage (a third) of MSF staffers celebrated the October 7 massacre, that some MSF employees have been linked to terror groups, and that MSF had donated to Gaza’s Ministry of Health but refused to respond when asked how MSF ensured that medical supplies weren’t getting hijacked by Hamas.

And a final comment by another former secretary general of MSF:

Rossin, a former secretary general who predated Destexhe, remains pessimistic that MSF can take a more balanced approach to Israel and Gaza moving forward.

“It cannot be fixed,” he said, exasperated. “How can you fix antisemitism, which is not an opinion but a mental disease?”

Although I long ago decided to give no more money to MSF, but divert it to organizations that have a “more balanced approach”, readers may wish to have a look at this article.  I was angered by MSF’s failure to even respond to my email about Israel, despite Kelly Houle and I having given them a substantial lump of money. (I haven’t asked Kelly for her opinion on this article.)

If you’re looking for reputable organizations that do good humanitarian health work without constantly impugning Israel and making unretracted false claims, I’d suggest you do what I did: go to Peter Singer’s list of reputable charities called The Life You Can Save. It shows a number of charities (not all involved with health), all of which have been vetted by Singer’s uncompromising criteria of providing the most assistance for the least money. The second time Kelly and I did an eBay auction of an autographed and illustrated book, my Faith Versus Fact, we deep-sixed MSF and gave all the money to Helen Keller International, a charity that prevents blindness and death in children by giving them inexpensive vitamin A supplements. The charity provides a lot of bang for the buck.

And you can bet that in my rewritten will, the part that goes for children’s health and poverty (the other parts go for wildlife conservation and purchasing lands for reserves) isn’t directed to MSF, but to Singer’s charities.

Bids for fancy “Faith versus Fact” copy near $3000

December 8, 2020 • 1:45 pm

The eBay auction for the fancy autographed and Kelly-Houle-illustrated edition of Faith Versus Fact is almost at $3000, which means $6,000 in donations for Helen Keller International as the friends of the charity are doubling all donations. (Every penny of the proceeds goes to that estimable and efficient charity.)

But that’s not nearly enough, I think, since an illustrated copy of Why Evolution is True, with fewer autographs of notables, fetched over $10,300.  Most of us are too poor to bid that much, but if you know a gazillionaire who wants a unique secular item, this would make a swell acquisition.

You can see a fuller description of the book here, and below are two of its pages: one with an illustration and another with some of the signatures.  Kelly and I have signed it, along with 28 secular notables, including three Nobel Laureates and the three living “Horsemen” (horsepersons?)  I didn’t schlep this book around for five years to have it go cheap!

Our auction is still running with three days to go: a multiply autographed and illustrated copy of Faith versus Fact

December 6, 2020 • 9:00 am

As I noted a few days ago, Kelly Houle and I are running an eBay auction for charity, with the object up for bid being a multiply-autographed hardback copy of Faith Versus Fact: Why Science and Religion Are Incompatible.  The copy for sale has 28 signatures of famous secularists, including the three surviving “horsemen”: Dan Dennett, Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris, as well as others like Steve Pinker, James Randi, Annie Laurie Gaylor, Dan Barker, and Julia Sweeney. It’s also signed by three Nobel Laureates: Harold Varmus, Adam Riess, and David Gross. See all the signers on my post or the auction site itself. It’s also signed by Kelly and me (I added a crude cat drawing.)

Further, the book has been illuminated with the calligraphy and artwork of our favorite natural-history artist, Kelly Houle, who did a superb title-page drawing and also a few cat drawings. Her artwork on the book can also be seen at the two sites.

Kelly and I did this previously with Why Evolution is True, earning more than $10,300 for a charity, in that case Doctors Without Borders. This year all auction proceeds go to Helen Keller International, an efficient and highly-rated charity that helps alleviate blindness and malnutrition throughout the world. (Peter Singer highlighted it as one of his favorite charities.) As a bonus, the Friends of Helen Keller International have pledged to double any donation, so whoever buys the book will have the satisfaction of contributing twice what they pay to a good humanitarian cause.

The price, with three days left to go, is still lower than I expected, as you can see from the screenshot below (click on it to join the fun). Remember, I schlepped that book around for five years from meeting to meeting, all to collect signatures for this auction. And Kelly labored through long nights doing the artwork. It’s worth more!

Kelly’s illumination of the title page (there are others) and one page of autographs.

One page also has Kelly’s anamorphic mirror drawing of James Randi, one of the signers; the mirror comes with the book:

If you have the dosh and want a unique book with great artwork and a collection of signatures never to be repeated (remember, Randi passed away recently), go over and bid. Or call the auction to the attention of those who might be interested. Remember, neither Kelly nor I make a penny from this, and Helen Keller International uses 82.5% of the donations for its programs—a very high proportion.

How can you overlook a book recommended by The Pinkah? (He also reviewed it favorably in Current Biology.)

The weak laws against female genital mutilation in America

August 22, 2019 • 10:25 am

I wasn’t aware that Ayaan Hirsi Ali had started a foundation, the “AHA Foundation“, one of whose goals is to ban female genital mutilation (FGM) in the U.S. You may not be aware that although FGM is illegal in one form or another in 35 states, there’s no ban on it in fifteen states. Here are the offending states:

Alaska
Hawaii
Montana
Washington (state)
Wyoming
Nebraska
New Mexico
Indiana
Kentucky
Mississippi
Alabama
Massachusetts (!!)
Vermont
Connecticut, and
Maine

For two decades there was a federal law against the practice, but a 2018 federal trial of several people accused of practicing FGM wound up with a judge ruling that FGM was a “local criminal activity”: therefore the states and not the government should regulate it. Thereby the judge overturned a 20-year-old law.

But even the nature of the state laws against FGM vary widely. If you look at the article below at the AHA Foundation, you’ll see the various kinds of FGM that are practiced, a map of which states have laws (and what kind of laws) against FGM, and what you can do about it. I’ve added the map, the “surgeries”, and how the laws differ. To get the pdf, click on the first screenshot below:

The various forms of FGM:

And here are the laws graded in terms of severity (and desirability):

.
.

The provisions that correspond to the “grades” are based on things like whether “vacation cutting” is illegal (i.e., parents can’t go to another country or state to get their daughters mutilated), whether practitioners and guardians can be prosecuted, whether or not “ethnic/religious culture” can be used as a defense, and whether there are education and outreach programs for at-risk communities. To get an “A” grade, all of these provisions have to be in place in the right direction, and only three states—Arkansas, Utah, and Michigan—get that “A”.

This is unconscionable. Why should it be legal for a parent to horribly mutilate the genitals of their daughters when their daughters can’t give permission?

In case you want to know, I’ve come around to the view that circumcision should also be illegal until a male is old enough to ask for it. I don’t think that asking, however, should allow you to get FGM, as it has but one nefarious purpose: to reduce the sexual pleasure of females. And it has a number of horrible side effects: infection, incontinence, infertility, and the like, and also has led to lifelong trauma. You probably know that Hirsi Ali herself was a victim of FGM.

My only beef is that Hirsi Ali’s pamphlet barely mentions Islam as a promoter of FGM. As it notes:

. . . FGM is not particular to any religious group, nor prescribed by any faith. It is actually a culturally-based practice, a harmful tradition passed on through families and communities that pre-dates all major religions. FGM has been co-opted by some religious sects, but there is no major religion that requires FGM.

Well, this is technically true, but FGM is most prominent in Islam, and, as I understand it, several sects of Islam do promote it strongly. I think the de-emphasis on Islam is a tactic adopted by the Foundation as a way to reduce the harm of FGM without being accused of “Islamophobia” if you oppose FGM.

And indeed, you should oppose it. If you live in one of the many states with no laws against FGM, or deficient laws, write your Senators and Congresspeople.

You can donate here, and I already have.

Although Hirsi Ali has been demonized, threatened, and put on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of “anti-Muslim extremists”, she’s been engaged in positive activity her whole political career, including writing her last book, Heretic, on how to reform Islam. And now she’s largely putting Islam aside to fight against a horrible form of anti-woman violence.

Note too that Maajid Nawaz was also on the SPLC’s list, which no longer exists (he sued them), and on the first page of the pdf the AHA Foundation thanks Nawaz’s foundation, Quilliam, for partnering on the FGM report.

These are people who are not keyboard warriors, but activists who take direct action to reduce palpable harm. I admire them and urge you to support them.

Here’s a list of the Foundation’s general goals:

Established by Ayaan Hirsi Ali to put the ideas she writes into practice, the AHA Foundation works to protect women from honor violence, forced marriage, and female genital mutilation. Our programs advocate for freedom of speech on campuses and in public debate, and amplify the voices of Muslim reformers and ex-Muslims.

Worth supporting, no?

Donations to Frank the Kitten more than double the amount requested; his life saved and many other cats helped

July 5, 2019 • 10:00 am

On July 1, I asked readers to contribute a few pounds toward saving the life of Frank the Kitten, who had a fatal liver issue that could almost certainly be cured with an operation. In fact, his owners, who could not afford the operation, sadly gave their beloved kitten to Feline Friends London (FFL; our Official Website Charity™) so that they could try to save him—not expecting to get him back again.

I am immensely happy to report, via the head of FFL (a completely volunteer operation, with all donations going to cat rescue), that the appeal raised more than twice the requested amount of £1000, so not only will Frank’s life almost certainly be saved with the operation, but we also have over £1300 pounds left over going to help other rescued kittens and cats.

Thanks so much to every reader who coughed up the dosh. I thank you, Barbara thanks you, Frank’s owners (who will get him back) thank you, other stray cats thank you, and as for Frank the kitten, well, that goes without saying.

Thanks for saving me!

Barbara, FFL’s head, sent me the email below, and, when I asked, gave me permission to post it.

Barbara’s email:

Hello Jerry

I’ve just counted up the donations to our appeal for Frank, the 15 week old cat who was diagnosed with a liver shunt as a kitten. We have received 135 donations at the time of writing, totalling £2312, so more than twice our target.

Thank you so  much for achieving this for Frank and, since we have received far more than the anticipated cost of Frank’s op, for our other cats in need too. I would like to thank those of your subscribers who have donated, for their generosity towards this young cat. I am truly moved. I have also been moved by the genuine and heartfelt gratitude of Frank’s owners, who are clearly overjoyed and relieved that they can get Frank the treatment he needs. They had originally asked us to take in Frank as they couldn’t afford his treatment but nevertheless wanted to save Frank’s life, and didn’t expect we would offer to do an appeal to fund Frank’s treatment and also allow them to keep Frank.

I will send updates on Frank. He wasn’t vaccinated so I asked Olivier, his owner, to start Frank on vaccinations, which he did earlier this week. Frank has been booked in for the second part of his vaccination course on 25 July and the operation to cure his liver shunt will be organised for soon after then. I asked Frank’s owner to get Frank vaccinated due to the risk of cat flu at a charity clinic, where they treat a lot of cats, many of whom are strays and could be cat flu carriers.

The success rate for this type of operation I believe is 90%. Although I know you are an atheist I will be praying for Frank’s op to be a success. When I look at cats and experience how they continue to inspire me day by day, I know only a force for good could have created a being so pure, so captivating and infinitely worthy of love and yet so vulnerable and desperately in need of all the help they can get from us mere humans.

Thank you again. I can’t tell you how grateful I am for all you have done in giving this little cat Frank, a chance and for helping other cats too.

Warm wishes
Barbara

Please donate to save Frank the Kitten’s life

July 2, 2019 • 8:00 am

Yesterday I appealed to readers to donate just one or a few pounds to save the life of a kitten, Frank, who needs an operation that will almost certainly save his life. If you can spare as little as one pound to give to Feline Friends London (FFL), please read the post and dig down a bit. His owners lost their jobs, and can’t afford the money, but they love him very much and so went to FFL for help.

Here’s Frank:

Please save my life!

You can donate here (and you can specify that the funds go to Frank’s medical care). We have about 300 of the 1000 pounds needed, and I appeal to you once again.

Many thanks!

An appeal for funds to save the life of Frank the kitten

July 1, 2019 • 8:45 am

As you may recall, our Official Website Charity™ is Feline Friends London, a stray-cat rescue organization that relies entirely on volunteer work and which uses 100% of donated funds to rescue cats, foster them, and adopt them out, with most of the dosh going for vet bills. I am a patron of this organization.

Today we have an especially poignant appeal to save an already-owned kitten whose owners can’t afford the vet bills. The cost to save Frank’s life is only about £1000, and I’m appealing to readers to help cover that fee. The story and pictures below come from Barbara, who runs FFL.

We have a couple of cats we are trying to raise funds for to cover vet costs. One is Frank, the kitten in the attached photos. He began having seizures when he was 9 weeks old. His owners asked us to take him on as they cannot afford the life-saving vet treatment he needs. His story is below.

Frank kitten began having seizures when he was 9 weeks old. He presented as being in a permanent daze, with excessive drooling and he could hardly eat. When his owners brought him to the vet, he was diagnosed with a liver shunt, a genetic condition where a blood vessel bypasses the liver. The proteins are not properly broken down, which produces ammonium in the blood, which then damages the brain and the internal organs.

The vet had to keep Frank on antibiotics, lactulose and a prescription diet. He is now 15 months old and doing better, but it is only a question of time before the antibiotics lose their effect and the seizures return. With high levels of ammonium in the blood, Frank may suffer again from seizures, hallucinations, loss of appetite, dizziness, vomiting and eventually kidney stones.

The good part is that Frank can be cured. An x-ray scan followed by surgery would be enough. However both are very costly and his owners lost their jobs earlier this year and struggle to pay their rent,  let alone to cover the cost of complex vet treatment. They both love Frank very much and want to save him, and so have asked Feline Friends London to take Frank into their care. Any donation would make a world of a difference in making this operation happen, to cure this sweet kitten’s liver shunt and give him a future.

We have over 60,000 readers now, and if everyone gave just a dollar, that would save Frank’s life sixty times over. I know that’s not feasible, but if some of you could just give $1, or $5, or $10, it wouldn’t take long until we could cover the costs of the operation.

I almost never ask readers to donate to a cause, and of course make no money off this website. If you could kick in just a few bucks for the kitties—think of it as recompense for what you learn here—I’d be immensely grateful.

You can donate to Frank’s surgery by CLICKING ON THIS SECURE LINK. You can donate any amount using your credit card.

Reader Peter says that you can direct the money toward Frank’s operation, but I think Barbara knows that the surge of donations in the next few days will go for that. His comment:

I think the link you included is their all-purpose donation page. They do have a “comment” field at the end of the donation process, where I indicated I was donating toward Frank’s medical costs.

Please help if you can. I thank you, Barbara thanks you, and as for Frank, well, that goes without saying.