Interview with Hala Khoury-Bisharat and Michael A. Becker
In this episode of EJIL: Live! Sarah Nouwen, Editor-in-Chief of the Journal, speaks with Hala Khoury-Bisharat, Lecturer in law, Ono Academic College School of Law, Haifa, Israel and Michael A. Becker, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Trinity College Dublin, about the Symposium on International Commissions of Inquiry, which appears in our 30:3 issue. Michael Becker first speaks about the motivation of the organizers – Doreen Lustig of Tel Aviv University, Sarah Nouwen and himself – to develop a project on Commissions of Inquiry (CoIs) and more specifically why they framed the project in terms of the difference that such commissions make. Hala Khoury-Bisharat then introduces her case study in the Symposium on the Goldstone Inquiry in Israel and the unintended backlash effects it produced for human rights organizations in the country. As the first Palestinian Israeli woman to hold a professorial position in Israel, she then elaborates, on a more personal note, on the obstacles that she, as a member of a minority in Israel, had to face and overcome in her career. The interview concludes with some reflections by Michael Becker on the possible future directions for international commissions of inquiry. The interview was recorded at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law. Thanks are given to the Lauterpacht Centre and to Pembroke College, Cambridge, for making the filming possible.