Association for Civil Rights in Israel

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel ( _he. האגודה לזכויות האזרח בישראל) was created as an independent non-partisan organization to protect human rights and civil rights in Israel and the territories under its control.

The association was created in 1972 and its founders were a group of people mainly academics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem that felt the need for an independent extra-parliamentary organization to protect civil rights.

The association established its views on the basic rights that were recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, that was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948, and the values in Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel. Today the association is the largest human rights organization in Israel, and is the only organization in Israel that deals with entire range of human rights, e.g. the right to live, freedom of speech and information, the right for education, etc.

The association is working to protect human rights through legislation by promotion of civil rights bills; through judicial means, by hearings in the different judicial instances, mostly through the Supreme Court of Israel; through educational means; through public means by writing publications, conducting continuing education programs in the educational system, and conducting educational activities among the Israeli Security Forces.

The association is an organization of members that works through a professional staff and volunteers. Among them, many central figures from the fields of the law, education, press, from the academy and from the general public. The association is completely independent in its actions. Its financial resources come from the membership fees and from donations in Israel and around the world. It does not receive money from political parties or from the government.

In 2000, ACRI received the Israel Bar’s annual prize for Contribution to Law and Society in Israel.

As of 2008, the president of the association is the author Sami Michael. Among the organization's previous presidents: Professor Ruth Gavison and Israeli Supreme Court Judges Shimon Agranat and Haim Cohen

The Emil Grunzweig Human Rights Award is an annual award made by the association to "an individual or NGO that has made a unique contribution to the advancement of human rights in Israel". The award was established in 1981 but was renamed in 1983 after the murder of activist Emil Grunzweig by a grenade thrown by a right-wing sympathizer during a Peace Now demonstration against the war in Lebanon.

External links

* [http://www.acri.org.il/ Association for Civil Rights in Israel]
* [http://www.acri.org.il/pdf/State2007.pdf ACRI's State of Human Rights Report 2007 - English]
* [http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/875477.html To Each His Own Justice - ACRI's 35th anniversary] , Ha'aretz
* [http://www.acri.org.il/eng/story.aspx?id=510 ACRI welcomes a new director]