On January 15, 2025, a post on Facebook by Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) declared, “Israel has used starvation as a weapon of war with hunger gnawing at the bodies of children and women in Gaza, claiming the lives of many and daily risking others.” PCHR referenced financial support from the Canadian government, tagged the Representative Office of Canada to the PA, and featured a logo of Canada on images accompanying the post.

Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) Facebook post with Canadian government’s logo.

PCHR – a Gaza-based NGO linked to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terror group, a Canada-designated terrorist organization (see below for details) – presented its Facebook post as part of a Canadian-government-funded UN-related project, the HAYA Joint Programme. Although the Government of Canada and the UN portray HAYA as being devoted to community-based and domestic violence against women, PCHR is exploiting this framework for anti-Israel demonization. 

Canadian Funding of the HAYA Joint Programme

The HAYA Joint Programme, funded by the Canadian government, officially focuses on community-based and domestic violence against women in Gaza and the West Bank through, inter alia, “putting in place prevention initiatives that support targeted households and communities for decreasing harmful practices, attitudes and behaviours toward women and girls.” HAYA is “jointly implemented by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN–Habitat), and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), in partnership with the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and the Ministry of Social Development as well as other ministries and civil society organizations.”

HAYA was announced as being a 5-year project in 2018. It was later extended for an additional two years, running until December 31, 2025.

The total budget for this project is CAD $25 million. The Canadian government’s profile of HAYA states that “funds [are] managed by implementing partners.” However, there is no available information on how these funds are disbursed, revealing a significant lack of transparency. This is concerning given some of the project’s partners – as discussed in this report.

PCHR is one of the NGOs involved in the project.¹ On its website, PCHR details a training course, which is “part of a partnership between the PCHR and UN Women through the HAYA Joint Programme” and which “aims to develop the knowledge and educational skills of teachers and parents in UNRWA schools, as well as help them acquire new educational skills that will contribute to reducing violence against women, particularly gender-based violence, based on an updated educational methodology promoting human rights.” Copies of these materials are not available online and are not subject to public scrutiny; there is no way to independently verify the messages PCHR conveyed in its presentations. 

It is unknown how much money was directed to PCHR as part of HAYA. It is also unknown to what extent PCHR’s involvement in the project was coordinated with Government of Canada officials or only with UN agencies.

PCHR Ties to PFLP Terror

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) engages in international anti-Israel advocacy campaigns, influencing and providing numerous materials to the International Criminal Court (ICC), as well as biased UN bodies. PCHR regularly uses language that deliberately demonizes Israel, as exemplified in the screenshot above.

Raji Sourani is PCHR’s founder and director. According to a 1995 article in the Washington Report, he served “a three-year sentence [1979-1982] imposed by an Israeli court which convicted him of membership in the illegal Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine…” He was also denied a US entry visa in 2012.

In February 2014, the PFLP organized a ceremony in Gaza honoring Sourani, featuring a speech by PFLP Politburo member, Rabah Muhana.  During the event, Sourani stated that “I was in the ranks of the Popular Front, and there were comrades who taught us with their own hands. This organization has given us much more. We hope that the direction and the sense of belonging that were planted inside us will remain in our minds. We don’t apologize and don’t regret our past, we are proud that once we were members of this organization and we fought in its ranks” (emphasis added).

Tellingly, in May 2023, as Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) was bombarding Israel with barrages of rockets from Gaza, PCHR published a statement (on file with NGO Monitor) in which it “affirms the right of the Palestinian people to resist the occupation by all available means, including armed struggle…” (emphasis added). After criticism, and under pressure from European government donors, this text was amended.

(For more information on PCHR’s PFLP ties, read NGO Monitor’s report “Palestinian Centre for Human Rights’ Ties to the PFLP Terror Group.”)

Rhetoric of Violence from HAYA Presenter

In addition to PCHR, Yousif Sharaf, a Gaza-based lawyer, presented at a HAYA training program in September 2023. 

On May 2, 2023, Sharaf eulogized Khader Adnan, a senior member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), a terrorist organization designated as such by Canada. On May 5, 2022, Sharaf tweeted, “God is great and praise be to God[.] The Palestinian people love martyrdom[.] A suicide operation in our occupied territories[.] 🥰” in reference to the attack in El’ad that day in which two Palestinian terrorists murdered four Israelis with axes. On March 3, 2022, Sharaf called Thaer Hammad, who killed ten Israelis, a “hero.”