A little over a decade ago, many European human rights organisations rallied behind what was hailed as the “Arab Spring.”
They embraced the language of freedom, democracy, and human rights, positioning themselves as champions of democratic transition. Their offices hosted conferences and workshops on freedom of expression and peaceful protest; and they offered grants and training programmes to journalists and activists. Europe’s rights-based rhetoric was loud, visible, and influential across the region. It seemed as if Europe was reaffirming its claim to moral leadership.
But that momentum all but vanished when the focus turned to Palestine. The confident rights-based discourse has given way to heavy silence, or, at times, outright bias, despite the fact that events on the ground have been more visible and better documented than ever.
The contradiction is striking. Several European institutions that once presented themselves as guardians of democracy and defenders of human rights have failed even to condemn the repression of pro-Palestinian demonstrations inside their own countries. In Germany, for example, police have banned the Palestinian flag and the wearing of the keffiyeh, broken up demonstrations with force, and arrested hundreds.
Michael O’Flaherty, the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights, has expressed concern in a letter to German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt. In it, he criticised restrictions on freedom of assembly and expression and cited reports of “excessive violence” by German police, stressing that such measures violated Germany’s international obligations. He also urged Berlin to stop misusing anti-Semitism laws to suppress legitimate protest.
Yet, Germany’s major political foundations – the Friedrich Naumann, Konrad Adenauer, and Friedrich Ebert Foundations – have remained silent. These are the same institutions that once organised scores of programmes to empower Arab youth during the uprisings of 2011. But when repression occurred in their own country, they could not even issue a statement of condemnation. Reports from the European Parliament confirmed that within just ten days, German police arrested hundreds of demonstrators, some sustaining serious injuries from police action.
In Britain, the picture has been no less troubling. The government there has passed a controversial law expanding police powers and criminalising protest under the pretext of “public order.”
Restrictions have also seeped into the British media. The BBC, long a symbol of impartial journalism, became embroiled in controversy after refusing to broadcast a documentary titled “Doctors Under Attack in Gaza,” which documented Israeli military strikes on Palestinian hospitals. The decision provoked internal dissent among BBC journalists, who accused the management of downplaying Palestinian suffering while amplifying Israel’s narrative.
The UK newspaper The Guardian called the decision “discrimination in humanity,” accusing the BBC of practising false neutrality that masked clear political bias. The Associated Press likewise noted that the BBC’s coverage fell short of the standards it claimed to uphold.
Language has also played a central role. Terms such as “massacre,” “slaughter,” and “atrocities” have been routinely used to describe Hamas’ actions but rarely applied to Israel. This linguistic asymmetry has reinforced accusations of dehumanisation and systematic bias. A study by the Centre for Media Monitoring in the UK concluded that the BBC had deliberately marginalised voices describing events in Gaza as “genocide” or “crimes against humanity,” eroding both its neutrality and credibility.
In the Netherlands, universities have become a battleground for freedom of expression. At the University of Amsterdam and other Dutch campuses, students have staged peaceful sit-ins in solidarity with the Palestinians. The response has been violent: protests have been dismantled by force, dozens of people have been arrested, tear gas and batons have been deployed, and advanced surveillance has been used against student activists.
The international rights group Amnesty International has condemned the Dutch police response as “excessive and unjustified,” while student unions have decried the erosion of free expression on campus. The irony is clear: the Netherlands, once proud of supporting student freedoms during the Arab Spring, has been criminalising the same activism when it concerns Palestine.
These incidents are not isolated. According to the European Civic Forum, at least 12 European countries imposed restrictions or outright bans on pro-Palestinian demonstrations in the six months following 7 October 2023. Some invoked “national security” or “incitement to hatred,” though most protests were peaceful.
LibertiesEU has likewise documented bans on Palestinian slogans and flags in countries such as Germany, Belgium, and Hungary, alongside violent police crackdowns on student protests. Yet, Europe’s leading human rights institutions have responded only with vague and formulaic statements of “concern.”
The hypocrisy becomes even clearer when compared with other contexts. In 2019, when protests erupted in Hong Kong, European governments rushed to condemn “police repression” and called for respect for the right to protest. When Russians took to the streets against the war in Ukraine, the European Commission issued strong statements denouncing the suppression of basic freedoms.
But when it comes to Palestine, where the United Nations documents daily war crimes by Israel, including deliberate civilian killings, systematic starvation, the denial of essential services, ethnic cleansing, and acts amounting to genocide, Europe responds with silence, equivocation, or attempted justification. The conclusion is inescapable: Europe’s human rights discourse is not universal but selective, deployed as a political instrument when useful and abandoned when inconvenient.
Part of the problem lies in the structural ties between human rights organisations, media institutions, European governments, and the security and intelligence agencies in Europe. Institutions that claim independence often rely heavily on government or EU funding, raising questions about their autonomy.
In Germany, party-affiliated foundations are openly described as “soft power arms” of the state’s foreign policy. Abroad, they promote influence under the banner of human rights; at home, when politics demand silence, they comply. The state media is no different. With boards dominated by state appointees and dependent on public funding, even Europe’s largest outlets are less independent than they appear.
The contradiction extends to European governments themselves. While criminalising the Palestinian flag on the streets, they refuse to impose sanctions on Israel. The EU has not suspended its association agreement with Tel Aviv nor halted Israel’s participation in the Horizon research programme, despite overwhelming evidence of Israeli violations of international law.
Economic, scientific, and military cooperation with Israel has been prioritised over human rights concerns. Official rhetoric is reduced to hollow slogans for domestic and international consumption.
A deliberate conflation is also at work between anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism, and freedom of expression. Criticism of Israeli policies is increasingly treated as a criminal offence. Yet, this approach cannot hold indefinitely. A collision between European public opinion and official policy appears inevitable, as governments, rights organisations, and media outlets attempt to obscure the reality of Israeli violence.
What we see today may be only a prelude to deeper transformations. The monopoly of Western governments, human rights institutions, and the security-bound media in shaping the narrative cannot last forever.
Taken together, these developments reveal an unprecedented crisis for Europe’s human rights project. What was once a matter of rhetorical inconsistency has become a profound erosion of moral and professional credibility. Values once brandished under the banners of freedom and human rights now appear as temporary tools – invoked when aligned with geopolitical interests, discarded when they conflict with them, particularly in the case of Israel.
This moment of exposure poses a stark question: how can Europe continue to claim moral authority on the global stage when its commitment to human rights is revealed to be nothing more than a political weapon?
The writer is a senator and former assistant to the foreign minister.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 28 August, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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