Tells the Facts and Names the Names sept. 1-15, 2010 Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair vol. 17, no. 15 The Body of the Terrorist Body Parts, Bio-Piracy and the Spoils of War at Israel’s National Forensic Institute By Nancy Scheper-Hughes n July 2009, I was identified as the Editorial Note: Nancy Scheper-Hughes is professor of anthropology at the University “whistle-blower” in the arrest by New of California, Berkeley, where she directs the doctoral program in medicine and soci- Jersey FBI agents of a Brooklyn or- gans trafficker, an orthodox rabbi, Isaac ety. Since 1996, she has been involved in active field research on the global traffic in I 1,2 Rosenbaum, whose unorthodox busi- human organs, following the movement of bodies, body parts, transplant doctors, their ness activities I had uncovered several patients, brokers, and kidney sellers, and the practices of organ and tissue harvesting in years earlier while investigating an in- several countries – from Brazil, Argentina, and Cuba, to Moldova, Israel and Turkey, to ternational network of outlaw transplant India, South Africa, and the United States. She is a co-founder of Organs Watch, an in- surgeons, their brokers, lawyers, kidney dependent, medical human rights, research and documentation center at UC Berkeley. hunters, insurance and travel agents, We are devoting this issue of the newsletter to her detailed report on the tis- safe house operators, and “baby sitters” sue, skin, bone and organ harvesting conducted for many years at Israel’s L. to mind sick and anxious internation- Greenberg National Institute of Forensic Medicine, a.k.a. The Abu Kabir Institute, al “transplant tourists.” The particular under the aegis of its former director and current chief pathologist, Dr. Yehuda criminal network, in which Rosenbaum Hiss. Long before Donald Boström leveled allegations of organ-harvesting played a bit part, originated in Israel from Palestinians in the Swedish tabloid, Aftonbladet, in August 2009, caus- through a “company” run by a well- ing furious accusations of “blood libel,” Dr. Scheper-Hughes had already inter- known crime boss Ilan Peri, who had viewed Dr. Hiss and had on tape the interview that forms part of her report here. over the years established shady trans- Dr. Scheper-Hughes says her purpose here is to refute the controversial of- plant deals and kidney transplant outlets ficial statements of the Ministry of Health and the IDF that while there may have and connections in Turkey, Moldova, the Ukraine, Brazil, Germany, South been irregularities at the National Forensic Institute, they have long since ended. Africa, the Philippines, China, Kosovo, To this day, she says, they have failed to acknowledge, punish, or rectify vari- Azerbaijan, Columbia, and the United ous medical human rights abuses, past and present at the National Forensic States.3 Institute. While many of the allegations are widely known, the testimony by The arrests, amidst gunfire in the op- Israeli state pathologist and IDF (reserve) Lt. Col. Chen Kugel has never been pub- erating rooms, of two of Ilan Peri’s trans- lished in English and his allegations are known only within Israel. Dr. Scheper- plant associates – Dr. Zaki Shapira, for- Hughes invited Dr. Kugel to speak publicly on this topic in the U.S. on May 6, 2010. merly of Rabin Medical Center, Petach There are two lawsuits ongoing in Israel at the present moment concerning the Tikva, Israel, and his Turkish associate Forensic Institute and Dr. Hiss. One concerns alleged abuses against the dead bodies Dr. Yusuf Sonmez – in a private hospi- of Israeli citizens. The other concerns Rachel Corrie, a U.S. citizen who was killed in Gaza 4 tal in Istanbul in 2007 gave pause to the in 2003 while protesting the demolition of houses. Transcripts of court proceedings Israeli Ministry of Health which, until show that Corrie’s autopsy was conducted in contravention of an Israeli court order then, had permitted Israeli sick funds that an official from the U.S. Embassy be present. These transcripts also show Dr. Hiss (medical insurance) to reimburse living conceding that he had kept samples from Corrie’s body without her family’s knowl- donors overseas with transplants, many edge. Dr. Hiss also testified that he was uncertain where these samples now are. For his of them trafficked from the former Soviet part, Dr. Kugel asserts that abuses at the Institute continue to this day. The Scheper- Union countries. The kidney sellers cap- tured in the Turkish shootout, however, Hughes article takes care to note Dr. Kugel’s description of his former mentor, Dr. Hiss, were two Palestinians, Omar Abu Gaber, as a man who saw himself as willing to take great personal and professional risks “to age 42, and Zaheda Mahammid, age 26. serve a noble end… to help the war-wounded victims of terrorist attacks,” with his The organ recipients were an Israeli man actions “as something sublime, or even heroic, as a modern-day Robin Hood.” AC/JSC of 68, Zeev Vigdor, and a younger South sept. 1-15, 2010 African man, John Richard Halford, who the Israeli-based transplant-trafficking Institute. Boström’s article suggested that were filmed on Turkish TV being carried scheme, now that there was a proven Palestinian bodies were being harvested out of the operating room on stretch- link to hospitals in New York City. The as the “spoils of war.” The Aftonbladet ers and taken to another hospital before NYC Commissioner of Health and the story, instantly translated into Hebrew being returned home, without the trans- FBI, whom I alerted years earlier about and English, created a firestorm of pro- plants they had so desired. the Rosenbaum transplant gang, had dis- test that included a libel lawsuit by anti- After his release from a German missed the information as lacking cred- defamation lawyers in New York City and prison in 2007, Peri returned to Israel, ibility. How could patients and kidney a boycott of Swedish industries. Boström where he was investigated for tax fraud,5 sellers from two different countries be was labeled an anti-Semite, and the story detained, but released because Israel’s smuggled into hospitals for illegal trans- he “dredged up from the sewer” was la- organ-transplant laws were murky with plants? How would they get through beled a despicable “blood libel” against respect to the legality of “brokering” the red tape required for any transplant Israel and the world’s Jews. overseas transplants using paid donors. operation? It sounded like an old wives’ I read these news reports with mount- In 2008, two new laws were passed by tale, an urban legend, or a blood libel ing dread. Like Boström, I was once the Israeli Parliament (Knesset): one that against Jewish surgeons and their pa- greeted during a research visit to Israel paved the way for applying brain death tients. And that was the worst suspicion in 2003 with an ugly headline and center- criteria that would satisfy the ultraortho- of all. Although the criminal justice sys- fold ( “New Blood Libel on French TV – dox, and the other that outlaws buying, tem refused to believe the story I gave Israel Steals Kidneys of Orphan Children selling and brokering organs for trans- them, transplant surgeons working in in Moldova”) in Makor Rishon, a right- plant.6 The Ministry of Health no longer hospitals in the U.S. who had been ap- wing tabloid.10 The feature story reviewed reimburses overseas transplants unless proached by Ilan Peri and his associ- an hour-long TV documentary by French they are legal. Peri continues to organize ates, including Isaac Rosenbaum, knew filmmaker Catherine Bentellier, Kidneys transplant tours, but today, he claims, it to be true and knew that some of their Worth their Weight in Gold. I had trav- using only deceased donor organs and colleagues were complicit in transplant eled with the filmmaker to Moldova in legal pathways. crimes that ranged from violating the 2001, where we interviewed people in In its heyday (1997-2007), the Israeli National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) villages that had been ravaged by organs transplant tourism/organ-trafficking in the buying and selling organs, to fraud, traffickers targeting young men and traf- network was an ingenious and extremely deception, money laundering, taking ficking them to Turkey, the Ukraine and lucrative multimillion-dollar program bribes, participating in organized crime Georgia as paid, sometimes coerced, that supplied a few thousand Israeli pa- and human trafficking. The Rosenbaum kidney providers to Israeli transplant tients and diasporic Jews worldwide with case, still in preparation, will be the first patients. The “blood libel” accusation the “fresh” organs and transplants they U.S. federal prosecution of crimes related featured medieval woodcuts and a blur- needed. With Rosenbaum’s arrest, the to organs trafficking.7 ry photo of me patting the hand of a U.S. media were suddenly interested in Then, in August 2009, another organ- Moldovan orphan in his crib. trafficking story broke, one that linked With respect to the Swedish “blood Rosenbaum’s U.S.-Israel organ-broker- libel” against the National Forensic ing and money-laundering schemes Institute at Abu Kabir, the main issue that EDITORS with much older allegations of organ- wasn’t raised in the avalanche of articles, Alexander Cockburn and-tissue stealing from the bodies of editorials, and news columns published in Jeffrey St. Clair Palestinian “terrorists” and stone throw- Israel, Europe and the United States was ASSISTANT EDITOR ers’ following autopsy at Israel’s National one simple question, “Was the organ theft Alevtina Rea Forensic Institute in Abu Kabir, a neigh- story true?” And were there any grounds borhood of Tel Aviv.