Its mission is to appeal Palestinian public opinion and to international opinion in order to bring about positive change in the human rights situation.

he Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group (PHRMG) is a NON BIASED Human Rights Monitoring Group which was founded in December 1996 in response to the deteriorating state of democracy and human rights under the newly established Palestinian Authority. The group was founded by a diverse group of well-established Palestinians, including Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) members, newspaper editors, journalists, a union leader, veteran human rights actisvists and religious leaders. The political composition of its founders is diverse - including members of many Palestinian organizations and institutions - thereby ensuring the non-partisan character of the organization.

The PHRMG documents human rights violations committed against Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, regardless of who is responsible. In effect, the PHRMG has dedicated much of its work to the monitoring of human rights violations committed by the Palestinian Authority. The PHRMG has instituted a number of projects to deal with the ongoing human rights violations. The projects include monitoring unit, freedom of expression and democracy center, settlers watch hotline and legal unit, etc… Our future projects in the coming two years include peace building development, peace building and conflict resolution monitoring, reforms to the Palestinian judicial system, democracy center, public education and out reach unit, etc...

PHRMG Relationship with the international, local community:
The PHRMG maintains strong ties with international human rights groups, media and donors. Their cooperation and partnership has proved vital to PHRMG’s outreach and support internationally, as well as to PHRMG’s ability to maintain its high degree of independence at home. As illustrations; Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Reporters without Borders regularly utilize PHRMG unpublished and published research for their reports. Since 1999, PHRMG director Bassem Eid gave 220 interviews to international media.

The PHRMG believes that in spite of the ongoing Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories and the need to denounce Israeli human rights abuses, such scrutiny is essential in the current process of state building, to ensure that the future Palestinian State will be a truly democratic one. In the long run, the protection of human rights can only strengthen the Palestinian Authority.

Due to the absence and/or poor reliability of traditional democratic mechanisms, the PHRMG's principle strategy since its foundation has been to appeal to Palestinian public opinion and to international opinion in order to bring about positive change in the human rights situation. Violations of Palestinian human rights by both Palestinian and Israeli authorities persist with little accountability and, for the foreseeable future, the PHRMG will maintain and improve upon its traditional human rights monitoring and outreach activities.