Head of HRW partner organization labeled a terrorist by Treasury Dept

Last week, the US Treasury Department added two people to their terrorist list:

The U.S. Department of Treasury today imposed sanctions on two al-Qa'ida supporters based in Qatar and Yemen. Abd al-Rahman bin 'Umayr al-Nu'aymi (Nu'aymi) and `Abd al-Wahhab Muhammad `Abd al-Rahman al-Humayqani (Humayqani) were named as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGTs) pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13224. Nu'aymi was designated for providing financial support to al-Qa'ida, Asbat al-Ansar, al-Qa'ida in Iraq, and al-Shabaab, and Humayqani was designated for providing financial support to and acting on behalf of al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

Nu'aymi is a Qatar-based terrorist financier and facilitator who has provided money and material support and conveyed communications to al-Qa'ida and its affiliates in Syria, Iraq, Somalia and Yemen for more than a decade. He was considered among the most prominent Qatar-based supporters of Iraqi Sunni extremists..... Both Nu'aymi and Humayqani are at the center of global support networks that fund and facilitate terrorism.

In 2013, Nu'aymi ordered the transfer of nearly $600,000 to al-Qa'ida via al-Qa'ida's representative in Syria, Abu-Khalid al-Suri, and intended to transfer nearly $50,000 more.

Nu'aymi has facilitated significant financial support to al-Qa'ida in Iraq, and served as an interlocutor between al-Qa'ida in Iraq leaders and Qatar-based donors. Nu'aymi reportedly oversaw the transfer of over $2 million per month to al-Qa'ida in Iraq for a period of time. He also served as an interlocutor between these Qatari nationals and al-Qa'ida in Iraq leaders. Between 2003 and 2004, Nu'aymi provided support to the Iraqi insurgency more broadly and served as a conduit for their broadcast materials to media outlets.

Nu'aymi as of mid-2012 provided approximately $250,000 to two U.S.-designated al-Shabaab figures, Mukhtar Robow and Sheikh Hassan Aweys Ali, the latter of whom is also designated by the United Nations (UN). Also in 2012, Nuaymi provided financial support to a charity headed by Yemen-based Abd al-Wahhab Muhammad 'Abd al-Rahman al-Humayqani, who channeled funding to AQAP.

But Nu'aymi also had another job - he was the head of a human rights group!

As Eli Lake at The Daily Beast writes:

Most of the world knows Abdul Rahman Omeir al-Naimi as a Qatari history professor and human-rights activist. The Swiss-based organization he founded, known as al-Karama from the Arab word for dignity, has worked closely with the United Nations and American human rights groups, most notably Human Rights Watch.

...Human Rights Watch has joined forces with al-Karama in campaigns to free political prisoners in the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia.

In an interview Thursday, Mourad Dhina, the executive director of al-Karama, said the news about his group’s founder and the head of its board came as a shock. “This is not good news for us,” he said.

.... The signs were there for some observers that al-Naimi may be an extremist, particularly when it comes to women. A 2007 U.S. cable first disclosed by WikiLeaks described him as an “Islamist hardliner” who was “critical of women taking up public leadership positions.” On Thursday, Gulf News reported al-Naimi was arrested in 2009 for opposing co-education at Qatari universities.

Is anyone surprised? So-called "human rights" organizations do not have any of the transparency or follow any of the methodologies that they demand from others. They are remarkably opaque as to how they write their reports and who they trust for partnering or to give them information.

We know that they decide what they want to say before they bother doing any research. They hire incompetent "experts." They act more like activists than like objective fact-finders. They ignore facts if they contradict their lies.

So why should it be surprising if they sometimes partner with people who share their goals who happen also to be terrorists?

(h/t Gidon Shaviv)