Claims of Israeli organ harvesting in Haiti

Claims of Israeli organ harvesting in Haiti, in the context of Israel's humanitarian mission following the 2010 Haiti earthquake, were made in the Iranian and Arab media, by Iranian Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, and on various anti-Israel websites. The charges led to UK lawmaker Baroness Jenny Tonge being sacked from her post as Liberal Democrat health spokesperson, after she suggested that Israel set up an inquiry to investigate them.
Background
Following the 2010 Haiti earthquake, Israel dispatched a rescue team to Haiti consisting of 220 professional doctors and rescue workers, two rescue planes loaded with equipment, and a field hospital, including operating rooms, intensive care units and X-ray equipment to take care of the injured. IsraAid, an Israeli humanitarian organization, sent a 15-person search-and-rescue team, which included emergency medical staff. Israeli disaster response organization ZAKA dispatched a six person team to assist with identification, extraction and rescue of victims., and Magen David Adom established field clinics in cooperation with local rescue groups and as part of a larger American Red Cross mission.
The Israel Defense Forces set up a satellite communications room with phone and wireless internet access, and video conference systems so surgeons working in the field hospital could contact medical experts back in Israel. Following a request from the United States and the United Nations, the Israel Police sent dozens of officers to join peacekeeping forces in Haiti, joining a group of Israel Police forensic investigators who flew to Haiti with the IDF's Home Front Command and medical team to assist in the identification of earthquake casualties shortly after the quake.
The Israeli humanitarian effort received widespread attention and praise for promptness and efficiency, from news channels CNN, CBS and Sky News, other rescue delegations, and former US President Bill Clinton.
Development
On 19 January 2010, a video was posted to YouTube by a Seattle, Washington resident calling himself "T. West", the self-proclaimed leader of "AfriSynergy Productions", a group whose declared goal is to empower the black man. In the video, which focused on the Haiti disaster, West repeated the false claims that the IDF stole organs in the past from Palestinians and others. He asserted that there is very little oversight during such tragedies, and that the Haitian people must beware of international medical groups who arrived in the country "for the money." He asserted that there are members of the search-and-rescue teams operating in Haiti who do not have a conscience, including the IDF.
The following day, Iranian state-run news channel Press TV published an article titled "Israel harvesting organs in Haiti?", reporting on West's YouTube video with the lead-in: "While media reports from Haiti express amazement at Israel's well-equipped medical delegation to the quake-stricken nation, some critics have warned against organ theft." The same day, the article was posted on the website of Dubai network Al Jazeera.
In a speech on 22 January, Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami said "There have been news reports that the Zionist regime, in the case of the catastrophe of Haiti, and under the pretext of providing relief to the people of Haiti, is stealing the organs of these wretched people."
On 27 January, Syrian TV broadcast a televised debate on the topic. A participating reporter said that the Israeli organ theft was "confirmed" by T. West, and mistakenly claimed that West's YouTube video showed Israelis stealing organs from the earthquake victims. Dr. Jassem Zakariya, credited as Professor of International Relations at Damascus University, said, "As we see, the Jew has not changed - especially the Zionist Jews, who are now gathered in the so-called 'Israel,' which is the largest concentration in history of war criminals, who committed crimes against humanity." Dr. Muhammad Mustafa Al-Habash, from the Department of Transplantation at Al-Mouassat University Hospital, stated that Israel had also stolen organs from Croatia and from prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
West's YouTube video was also reported on by Hezbollah's Al-Manar television's website and American politician David Duke repeated the allegations.
Boston blogger Steven Lendman repeated the claim in an article he wrote in The Palestine Telegraph titled “Focus on Israel: Harvesting Haitian Organs”. The article referenced Hizbullah’s Al-Manar TV citing West's YouTube video.
Jenny Tonge
Baroness Jenny Tonge, Member of the United Kingdom House of Lords, Liberal Democrat Health Spokeswoman and patron of The Palestine Telegraph, told The Jewish Chronicle there should be an inquiry into claims that Israeli troops sent there after the earthquake were trafficking organs.

To prevent allegations such as these - which have already been posted on You Tube - going any further, the IDF and the Israeli Medical Association should establish an independent inquiry immediately to clear the names of the team in Haiti.

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg dismissed Tonge from her post as health spokeswoman, saying that her comments were "wrong, distateful and provocative".
In a correspondence posted on an anti-Israel activism message board, Tonge blamed the situation on Jewish Chronicle editor Stephen Pollard.
In 2004, Tonge was fired as a party spokeswoman on children's issues after suggesting she could consider becoming a suicide bomber, had she been Palestinian.
Other comments
Abraham Foxman of the anti-Defamation League wrote in The Miami Herald that the affair highlighted the problem that the internet allows bigots to spread hateful messages with greater speed and ease. "While the First Amendment protects essentially all hate speech, except that of direct threats against specific people, it does not mean that we should accept hate on the Internet as something that we are powerless to confront. There is a role to play for Internet users, Internet companies, educators and parents. We need to identify and develop practical solutions to the pressing issue of online hate, so that the extremists do not get the upper hand. The challenge is how to tame the Wild Wild West while adhering to the First Amendment."

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