One of the most urgent questions for anyone advocating or studying human rights is under what conditions they become a genuine threat to the structures of domination. The recent attack on human rights organizations in Israel sheds some light on this question.
Human rights groups in Israel, particularly those focusing on the rights of colonized Palestinians, have been criticized by different governments and an array of conservative political actors for years. Nonetheless, only relatively recently have Israeli human rights NGOs come to be considered a security threat that must be tamed through repressive legislation and incitement campaigns.
Many pundits have framed the intense assault on human rights organizations as part of the battle between liberal and illiberal forces within Israel. While this is definitely true, particularly when taking into account the proto fascist character of some of the political parties currently in government, the strife between these two camps does not fully explain the recent escalation.
