Annelle Sheline, a Middle East analyst who promoted human rights on behalf of the United States government, has become the latest staffer at the US Department of State to leave her post in opposition to President Joe Biden’s Israel policy.
Sheline announced her resignation in an interview with the Washington Post on Wednesday, as the official death toll in Gaza reached 32,490 since October 7 and the World Food Programme has warned that famine in the enclave is imminent.
“I wasn’t able to really do my job any more,” Sheline told the newspaper. “Trying to advocate for human rights just became impossible.”
Sheline’s resignation followed another State Department official, Josh Paul, a director in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, who resigned in October of last year, and Department of Education official Tariq Habash, a Palestinian American and Biden political appointee, who resigned in January.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Habash said Sheline’s decision to leave underscored how the United States’s standing both at home and abroad has diminished amid the war in Gaza.
“It’s not surprising that there are people who tried to do important and critical work related to human rights at the State Department who felt like they were unable to do their job,” he said.
“It’s not surprising that [Sheline] felt like the only way that she can make an impact is by leaving, because in almost six months we’ve seen no substantive change in policy, and our influence at the international stage seems to be disintegrating by the day,” he said.
Sheline joined the State Department through a fellowship with the Bureau of Democracy, Labor, and Human Rights (DRL) as part of the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. She was tasked with promoting human rights and compiling annual reports on the issue. She holds a PhD and had previously been a researcher at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
Her work at the State Department, she told the newspaper, involved coordinating with activist and civil society groups across the Middle East and North Africa region. She said she saw firsthand how US credibility has degraded among those groups as the war progressed.
“If they are willing to engage, they mostly want to talk about Gaza rather than the fact that they are also dealing with extreme repression or threats of imprisonment,” Sheline said of the groups she worked with across the region.
“The first point they bring up is: How is this happening?”
Sheline’s departure came as the Biden administration has continued to pledge support for Israel, even while rhetorically warning Israeli counterparts about an expected ground operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
Earlier this week, US Vice President Kamala Harris warned of “consequences” if Israel launches a ground assault, but officials have so far refused to leverage aid. A day after Harris’s comments, the US abstained from a UN Security Council vote calling for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza.
Source: Al Jazeera
