What the European Union Wants Israelis Not to Know - by Evelyn Gordon

...Yet if an organization is an instrument of a foreign country’s foreign policy, it’s very hard to argue that it’s an objective “human rights organization,” as the organizations in question bill themselves. Rather, it’s an overtly political organization that seeks to pressure Israel into adopting the foreign government’s preferred policies. And making this known definitely could be “stigmatizing,” in the sense that Israelis might be less willing to trust an organization’s assertions once they realize it has a not-so-hidden policy agenda that could be influencing its reports.

AP Photo/Stefano Medici

Evelyn Gordon..
Commentary Magazine..
14 July '16..
Link: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/foreign-policy/middle-east/israel/eu-wants-israelis-not-know-breaking-the-silence/

In the three days since Israel passed a law mandating new reporting requirements for NGOs that are primarily funded by foreign governments, there’s one question I have yet to hear any of its critics answer. If, as they stridently claim, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with NGOs getting most of their funding from a foreign government, then why would simply being required to state this fact in all their publications exercise a “chilling effect” (the U.S. State Department) or “stigmatize” them (the New Israel Fund) or result in “constraining their activities” (the European Union)?

The obvious answer is that the critics know perfectly well it isn’t alright: An organization that gets most of its funding from a foreign government isn’t a “nongovernmental” organization at all, but an instrument of that government’s foreign policy. In fact, with regard to the EU, that’s explicit in its funding guidelines: For an Israeli organization that conducts activities in the territories to be eligible for EU funding, it must comply with EU foreign policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This, incidentally, also explains why 25 of the 27 organizations affected by the law are left-wing: The far-left is the only part of Israel’s political spectrum that shares Europe’s opinions on the conflict, and hence, that Europe is willing to fund.

Yet if an organization is an instrument of a foreign country’s foreign policy, it’s very hard to argue that it’s an objective “human rights organization,” as the organizations in question bill themselves. Rather, it’s an overtly political organization that seeks to pressure Israel into adopting the foreign government’s preferred policies. And making this known definitely could be “stigmatizing,” in the sense that Israelis might be less willing to trust an organization’s assertions once they realize it has a not-so-hidden policy agenda that could be influencing its reports.

That, however, is precisely why Israelis have a need and a right to know where these organizations’ funding is coming from–especially given this funding’s sheer scale. And it’s also why there’s nothing remotely undemocratic about the law, as explained in depth by legal scholar Eugene Kontorovich here.

Nevertheless, if this is really what the law’s critics fear, then they’re behind the times. In the years since the idea of legislating this law first arose, most of the organizations in question have made themselves so toxic that it’s hard to see how information about their foreign funding could make Israelis view them any more negatively. Thus the more likely impact of publicizing their funding sources won’t be to delegitimize the organizations, but to delegitimize their donors–which is precisely why Europe, which provides most of this funding, is so worried.

NGO Transparency Law: How To Really Defy Unscrupulous Discrimination - by Sheri Oz

...Individual donors have every right to remain anonymous. After all, they represent only themselves. Governments cannot remain anonymous because they represent the vested interests of nations whose interests may or may not coincide with those of our country. If you think you know what is best for Israel, and think you can conduct domestic and foreign relations better than our elected leadership, maybe you should run for Prime Minister rather than operating an NGO whose source of funds you feel you must keep secret.

Sheri Oz..
Israel Diaries..
14 July '16..

There is something you can do about the Transparency Law if you really think it unscrupulously discriminates against left-wing organizations.

In criticizing the passage of the Transparency Bill into Law, the Left is attempting to paint the Law as blatantly discriminating against organizations that operate in opposition to the views of the right wing government. The New Israel Fund (NIF), associated with many of the affected NGOs, disapproves of the law.

While the pretext for this bill is greater “transparency,” what it really does is create a series of new hoops that organizations that criticize Israeli government policy must now jump through or face huge fines. Targeted to progressive organizations, especially human rights organizations, that receive foreign government funding, the bill deliberately avoids requiring funding transparency of right-wing and settler organizations, which receive millions each year from foreign individuals.

I must admit that I just don’t get what all the fuss is about. Why should you have a problem revealing the identity of those who support your own goals? I once ran an NGO. If some French government body had wanted to donate money to the operation of my NGO, I would have proudly shouted it from the rooftops, unless the French government told me not to and made their donation to me dependent upon my silence, that is. Your anger at having to reveal the sources of your funds sounds fishy to me.

As I think more and more about the fuss the Left is making about the Transparency Law, the more confused I get. Here are the things I am confused about:

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Portrayal of Israeli law airbrushes political NGOs at BBC News - by Hadar Sela

...Clearly this report does not provide audiences with a realistic, accurate and impartial view of either the new legislation or some of the political NGOs it will affect. Given the BBC’s longstanding dismal record on informing its audiences of the “particular viewpoint” of the cadre of NGOs it quotes and promotes (in breach of editorial guidelines on impartiality) that will hardly come as a surprise to BBC Watch readers.

Hadar Sela..
BBC Watch..
13 July '16..

On July 12th the BBC News website’s Middle East page published an article titled “EU criticises Israel law forcing NGOs to reveal foreign funding” which included some rather confused language in the description of its subject matter.

The article’s introductory paragraph provides an accurate description of the groups affected by the new law but does not clarify that “from abroad” means from foreign governments.

“The EU has criticised a controversial new Israeli law targeting non-governmental organisations that receive most of their funding from abroad.”

Further on in the article, however, those groups are given a different title which is clearly intended to shape audience perceptions of the story. [emphasis added]NGO law art main

“But the EU said the requirements, which mostly affect human rights groups, went “beyond the need for transparency”.”

And:

“Analysis by the Israeli justice ministry found there were 27 NGOs in Israel that would be affected by the law, of which 25 were human rights groups identified with the Left, Israeli media reported.”

The link in that paragraph leads to a report from Ha’aretz which does not provide the names of those “human rights groups” but does include a link to another Ha’aretz article on that topic which is behind a pay wall and hence inaccessible to most readers. In other words, the BBC does not allow readers to judge for themselves whether or not the title “human rights groups” is justified and accurate in all cases. It does go on to tell them that:

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Israel, Secrecy, and American Meddling - by Elliott Abrams

...Is this really a problem, though? Is foreign intervention in Israeli politics a serious issue? You bet, and one of the main culprits turns out to be the United States of America.

Elliott Abrams..
Pressure Points..
13 July '16..
Link: http://blogs.cfr.org/abrams/2016/07/13/israel-secrecy-and-american-meddling/

The Israeli Knesset has just passed a law requiring that NGOs who receive more than half their budget from foreign governments and organizations state this publicly. A clamor has arisen, with critics denouncing the new legislation as anti-democratic.

This strikes me as ridiculous, and let’s do some hypotheticals. The UK is facing the Brexit referendum, and the government of France secretly funds pro-Remain groups. Is that fair or democratic? In the past decade several states in our country held referenda over same-sex marriage. How would we feel if it turned out groups proposing a “yes” vote had been funded by the government of Sweden? We would feel, as the Brits would feel in my first example, that our internal debate was being thwarted and distorted by foreigners. That is precisely how the Israeli lawmakers who voted for the new law felt. Prime Minister Netanyahu said the new law will “prevent an absurd situation in which foreign countries meddle in the internal affairs of Israel.” He’s right.

In Israel, many leftist groups that endlessly attack not only the current /government and its policies but the legitimacy of Israel and the conduct of the IDF have been funded largely by European countries. The new Israeli law does not prevent this, and does not interfere with free speech, but merely says the financial facts must be stated in all public communications by the recipient Israeli group. No doubt the net effect will be to undermine the credibility of such groups, or so it seems to me–and presumably to the new law’s drafters. If you learn Monday that the Netherlands loudly denounced Israel in the UN, and Tuesday that some Israeli group denouncing the government is funded by the Netherlands, you may well put two and two together. In any event, you ought to have the relevant information.

Is this really a problem, though? Is foreign intervention in Israeli politics a serious issue?

You bet, and one of the main culprits turns out to be the United States of America. Politico has a story today headlined “Senate report: State Dept. grant also aided campaign to unseat Netanyahu.” Here is more:

Who Profits: Exposing the true face of BDS - Nadav Shragai

Under a policy of strict anonymity, an Israeli NGO provides anti-Israel groups with research on companies operating in "occupied territories" • NGO Monitor exposes the true face of Who Profits, an organization considered to be "spearheading global BDS."

Nadav Shragai..
Israel Hayom..
15 April '16..

Galshan Shvakim, a company that provides personal security and guard services, has never been secretive about providing services to many local authorities in Judea and Samaria. In early November 2015, one of the company's guards was attacked by a female terrorist at the entrance to the settlement of Beitar Illit. The guard was lightly hurt in the incident, but not before shooting and neutralizing his assailant. Three months later, another of the company's employees chased away a car full of terrorists who had opened fire on an Israeli bus at the Ramot intersection near Jerusalem. On the whole, Galshan security personnel work in many locations in Judea and Samaria, like Givat Ze'ev, Gush Etzion, Adam and Kiryat Arba.

Three months ago, however, the CEO of the company, Moran Raz, learned that someone really doesn't like the fact that his company is financially invested in Judea and Samaria, or that it provides security to Israeli citizens living there. In January, a letter arrived at his desk, signed by an organization named "Who Profits from the Occupation," informing him that Galshan Shvakim has three months to respond to information obtained by the organization suggesting that the company operates in the "occupied territories."

The team working for Who Profits informed Raz that they intended to add his company to a blacklist of companies and Israeli institutions that operate in settlements or anywhere in Judea and Samaria, the Golan Heights or east Jerusalem.

Unlike other recipients of this form letter, Raz was not overly concerned by this veiled threat. His company has no business dealings outside Israel and therefore there was little chance of damage to the business should someone outside of Israel peruse this blacklist, see the company's name and decide to boycott its nonexistent dealings abroad.

On the other hand, for Israeli companies that do operate abroad, like the cosmetics giant Ahava, or international companies that operate in Israel like the security company G4S, Who Profits' campaign and others like it can actually deal a serious blow. In 2012, businesswoman Abigail Disney announced that she was waiving her profits from the Ahava factory in which she had invested after Who Profits accused Ahava of "extracting their mud from occupied Palestinian territories" and "exploiting Palestinian natural resources."

The European Parliament canceled its contracts with the international security company G4S, which they had employed since 2008, after receiving letters and being subjected to pressure by various NGOs going by Who Profits' data.

In a joint report compiled by Who Profits and the Coalition of Women for Peace, German railway company Deutche Bahn was listed as one of the companies involved in the train project connecting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. In the report, the company was described as having abandoned the project after learning that part of the train route was to pass through areas outside the Green Line.

Who Profits, together with the Coalition of Women for Peace, also lobbied the EU to cancel the EU-Israel trade agreement relating to the Israeli pharmaceutical industry. The Coalition of Women for Peace in fact led the lobbying and campaigning in the European Union in the period leading up to the vote on the agreement and trade protocol with the Israeli pharmaceutical industry.

Who Profits does not take direct action. It provides information and publicizes data on Israeli companies with financial dealings in Judea and Samaria, east Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. And yet, the significance of the organization's activity is profound. Being added to the Who Profits blacklist means almost immediate exposure to BDS campaigns and active lobbying designed to undermine the company's business.

Concealed identities

This week, the organization NGO monitor issued a comprehensive report on Who Profits, in which the group was described as "spearheading global BDS." For years, NGO Monitor has been generating and distributing critical analyses and reports on the activity of various nongovernmental organizations that operate under various pretenses to reject Jewish rights, to enact anti-Israel boycotts and even reject the existence of the State of Israel.

In their latest report, NGO Monitor focused on the little known fact that the database that serves as the foundation of the global BDS movement is actually based in Israel and that its founders, at least according to Israeli records, are Israeli. Itay Reuveni, who compiled the report on Who Profits, remarked that the fact that Who Profits is an Israeli organization lends it particular credibility among BDS supporters around the world.

The Who Profits project began in 2007. It started as "a research project of the Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP) -- a feminist, Palestinian-Jewish organization devoted to the struggle against the occupation" and "in response to the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement" against Israel. Six years later, Who Profits became an independent organization, but continues to closely cooperate with the Coalition of Women for Peace.

The members of Who Profits do not reveal their identities and their names are not mentioned on the Who Profits website or in any of the organization's official correspondence. According to the Justice Ministry's Registrar of Nonprofit Associations, Who Profits was founded by Esther Mitzenmacher, Rona Moran, Yara Saadia, Ines Elias, Deborah Lerman, Anat Matar and Hannah A'mori.

How Not to Be Silenced by ‘Breaking the Silence’ on Campus - by Gerald Steinberg

...Whether or not the proposed Israeli legislation is passed, or instead, European governments negotiate guidelines with the government, this will not end the debate on American college campuses. In these cases, one option would be to demand that all such appearances and events with BtS and similar groups include an Israeli who served in the IDF and can present a very different picture. If necessary, the sponsoring organization will have to pay for the costs of ensuring a fair discussion. In that way, BtS will not be given the privileged position it currently enjoys, based on its $1 million budget, and instead of propaganda, college campus and other audiences will be able to hear different perspectives and decide for themselves.

Gerald Steinberg..
Algemeiner.com..
30 March '16..

JNS.org – For some, the members of the Israeli NGO calling itself Breaking the Silence (BtS) are “whistleblowers” and human rights activists; for others, they are a tiny group of dangerous messianists who tour the world promoting anonymous and false allegations of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) war crimes. The recent exposé on Israel’s Channel 2 showing how they gather sensitive and potentially classified information on IDF tactics and equipment — far removed from any human rights claims — increased the suspicion and hostility with which they are viewed by many Israelis.

This debate is important, particularly when some college students in the US are trying to push the BtS activists into Jewish and pro-Israel frameworks such as Hillel. In response, critics note that although BtS is a fringe group with a handful of activists, unfounded accusations against Israel feed BDS (the Boycott, Divestment Sanctions movement), demonization and other forms of political warfare. BtS speakers’ allegations seem persuasive simply because they are Israelis, have served in the military, and look the part of righteous whistleblowers.

In these controversies, the details appear to get lost, while vague ideological perceptions take over. BtS supporters —including the CEO of the New Israel Fund (NIF), a BtS core funder — use shut-down techniques, arguing that valid criticism of the group is a “smear campaign.”

The real problem with BtS is the money they have, provided by irresponsible donors, including European governments and the NIF. Together, these funders give over $1 million every year to BtS under the official façade of promoting human rights and international law among Israelis. These donations enable a handful of activists to buy influence completely disproportionate to their size in Israeli society. With this money, BtS holds events in churches, parliaments, and universities, promoting specious allegations of Israeli “war crimes” and other immoral acts. To make their arguments seem reasonable, BtS activists and their supporters systematically strip away the context of Palestinian terror and thousands of rocket attacks, leaving only a highly exaggerated and fictitious version of Israeli responses.

For the European governments, the “kosher certificate” provided by the NIF to BtS is enough to justify much larger grants, which go unsupervised and are renewed year after year. NGOs in general are a big business in Israel, and external funding for the radical political groups is very controversial. Due to its central role, the NIF is seen by many Israelis as a self-selected and externally based alternative government to Israel’s elected leadership, operating outside any of the democratic checks and balances. A small group of NIF officials meeting in total secrecy provide seed money, and help their NGOs file applications and gain access to the European state funders, which then increase the existing budget many times over.

How NGOs Became a Weapon in the War on Israel - Prof. Gerald Steinberg

...The intense rhetoric of the NIF reflects their genuine concern that, by highlighting the massive European funding for its associated NGO network, the organization will lose standing and influence on the Israeli center and center-Left. From this perspective, the stakes are even higher than the question of foreign funding for NGOs. They and their patrons believe the NGO bill threatens a political structure they have built up over almost four decades. For Israel itself, however, the stakes are even higher. In question is Israel’s right to reassert its national sovereignty in the face of foreign manipulation, demand transparency from unelected groups that campaign intensely against the policies of its elected government, and counter an international campaign of hate and defamation that potentially threatens Israel’s very existence.

Prof. Gerald Steinberg..
Tablet Magazine..
Issue 35 February '16..

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are very big business in Israel. Various NGOs—most of them from the Left and claiming to promote human rights and democracy—are very active in the Knesset, in filing lawsuits with the Supreme Court that seek to overturn government policies, and in the media. They receive hundreds of millions of shekels from large foundations and foreign governments—primarily European. While the activities of these NGOs are criticized by the Israeli Right, much of the mainstream Israeli media supports them. As a result, the “halo effect” that protects these NGOs from independent investigation is particularly strong.

But that halo was shattered recently when the popular Israeli television news program Uvda featured a hidden-camera expose of a little-known “peace group” known as Ta’ayush, led by activist Ezra Nawi. The footage showed Nawi, along with Nasser Nawaja, a Palestinian employee of the NGO B’Tselem, plotting against an Arab who was negotiating to sell private land in the West Bank to Jews. They were trying to lure the Palestinian into a trap where he would be captured by the Palestinian Authority’s security services. As Nawi coldly noted in the video, under PA law, the sale of Palestinian land to Israelis is punishable by death.

The broadcast became headline news and the fallout continued for weeks. Nawi was arrested at Ben-Gurion Airport when he tried to flee the country. A few days later, a follow-up program aired more hidden-camera footage, this time showing Nawi with officials from two other prominent “human rights” NGOs—Breaking the Silence (BtS) and Rabbis for Human Rights (RHR). Both groups were shown giving money to Nawi, who then handed out checks to Palestinians, apparently for taking part in violent demonstrations. RHR claimed that Nawi was paid for providing transportation services. BtS denounced everyone involved in the program as “Stasi,” a reference to the notorious East German intelligence service.

The report was particularly explosive because Nawi had been an iconic hero to the far-Left in Israel and beyond—a gay Sephardi peace activist and pacifist who embodied Western orientalist myths. Prominent leftists like Noam Chomsky and Naomi Klein described him as “one of Israel’s most courageous human rights activists.” David Shulman, who writes highly critical articles on Israel in The New York Review of Books and happens to be a member of Ta’ayush, referred to Nawi as an Israeli Gandhi. In 2009, after Nawi was convicted of assault following a demonstration, he became the focus of an international campaign, including a sympathetic portrayal in Time magazine. The fiercely anti-Zionist Jewish Voice for Peace claimed to have collected 20,000 signatures on a petition to save him from jail. But in 37 minutes, the Channel 2 program destroyed Nawi’s image.

In a wider context, the timing of the reports was damaging to the entire NGO establishment in Israel. It came in the middle of an intense controversy over the role of Israeli NGOs in the worldwide campaign to demonize Israel through the use of terms such as “apartheid,” the rise of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, and the use of “lawfare” to charge Israeli officials with war crimes and other supposed transgressions of international law.

Prior to the Uvda broadcasts, BtS and its patrons were the particular focus of growing anger among many Israelis on the Right, center, and even the center-Left. This anger followed a major jump in the visibility of BtS, which reflected the group’s million- dollar budget. BtS events in churches, universities, and national parliaments around the world featured “anonymous testimony” that alleged systematic immorality by IDF soldiers, with no corroborating evidence.

Hope is not a strategy. Building new communities and neighborhood is. - by Caroline Glick

...We get it. The Obama administration and the EU aren’t attacking Israel because we did something wrong. They’re attacking us because they want to hurt us. That is their goal. Recognizing this sorry truth, the public elected the Likud and its coalition partners to defend our interests and our rights. Hope is not a strategy. Building new communities and neighborhoods, expanding the writ of Israeli law and curtailing the activities of subversive foreign agents is a strategy. And a good one.

Caroline Glick..
Column One/JPost..
28 January '16..

Our government is playing games with itself. And losing.

On Wednesday Chaim Levinson reported in Haaretz that for the first time in nearly two years, last week the Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria approved new building plans for a small number of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria.

Levinson also reported that last month Jerusalem’s municipal planning and building commission gave final approval to plans to build nearly 900 housing units in the southern neighborhood of Gilo. Initial approval was granted back in 2012.

But in the intervening three years, the commission refused to allow them to go forward.

From the report, we learn that the government’s critics in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria who claimed that it was barring Jewish building were right all along. Despite the government’s denials, the fact is that for at least the last year and a half, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his ministers maintained an undeclared freeze on construction for Israeli Jews in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

During this period, Jews have only been permitted to build in these areas either on the basis of plans that had received final approval before the unofficial freeze took effect, or in cases where refusal to approve building would have involved admitting that a freeze was in effect. So, for instance, in areas where the rights of Jews to their property in Judea and Samaria have been challenged before the Supreme Court by EU-financed Israeli NGOs like Yesh Din, the government has defended those rights and so given permission for Jews to exercise their property rights.

The government opted to enact this unofficial building freeze, and so trample the civil rights of hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens, in the hopes of convincing the Obama administration to protect Israel from Palestinian efforts to pass anti-Israel resolutions at the UN Security Council.

It might have been possible to justify the government’s behavior – or at least to understand it – if it had brought about the hoped for benefits.

If President Barack Obama had responded to Netanyahu’s radical concession by burying the hatchet and supporting Israel at the UN and on the international stage more generally, then perhaps the move would have been worth it.

But that didn’t happen. Over the past 18 months, the administration – backed by much of the Israeli Left – has escalated its anti-Israel policies and rhetoric. Even as the government curtailed the property rights of Israeli Jews in the hopes of appeasing him, Obama along with Secretary of State John Kerry has led the charge in wrongly blaming Israel for the absence of peace with the Palestinians.

Obama and Kerry have engaged in acts of deliberate libel by falsely accusing Israel of institutional racism against the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria.

Bashing Israel’s pro-democracy efforts - by Anat Berko

...Adding to the hypocrisy: The European Union has recently decided to label Israeli products that come from Judea and Samaria so consumers can make informed decisions about the political implications of the origin of those products. If such disclosure is important for choosing products in the grocery store, it’s hard to see why it wouldn’t be much more important for those trying to influence another country’s political process.

Anat Berko..
NY Post/Opinion..
24 January '16..

If you believe Israel’s relentless critics in the media and now in the State Department, Israeli democracy is on death’s door.

The irony is, this accusation comes in response to Israel’s efforts to actually preserve and strengthen democracy from the forces that seek to weaken it.

The fuss is about Israel’s proposed law requiring transparency from political organizations in our country funded by foreign governments.

My country can’t ignore the protests, especially since US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro has publicly joined them, after voicing his objections to Ayelet Shaked, Israel’s justice minister and the force behind this proposal. Shaked has also been defending the policy to European governments, which provide the lion’s share of funds to these groups.

Shapiro thinks this law would erode democracy in Israel. He’s not alone in this hyperbole: Major American newspapers have published editorials on it, even making the absurd comparison between Israel and Putin’s Russia.

So let’s set the record straight, for Ambassador Shapiro and the American public. Here are the facts about the proposed law:

It doesn’t prohibit any activity whatsoever. Even entities funded entirely by foreign governments will still be free to do and say whatever they want in Israel.

But — and this is crucial — the groups that claim to be nongovernmental but are actually instruments of foreign governments will be acknowledged as such.

The bill does one thing and one thing only: When more than half of an entity’s funding comes from foreign governments, it must disclose that fact and the amount of funding from those governments. That’s it.

It’s similar to several statutes in the United States. Both the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and more recent laws adopted by Congress impose special disclosure requirements on individuals and organizations funded by foreign governments. There’s a simple reason for such requirements. Without them, organizations held out as NGOs — that is supposed to mean nongovernmental organizations — operate as stealth diplomats funded by foreign governments without saying so.

This lets them do what diplomats do — press other countries for actions and policies they favor — without any of the consequences, trade-offs and publicity that proper diplomacy entails. In the intelligence world, entities that do these things are called “agents of influence.” Every country tries to identify such groups.

Why Israel’s NGO Bill Is Absolutely Vital - by Evelyn Gordon

...these NGOs are wholly-owned subsidiaries of European governments; indeed, the main reason they conduct so much of their activity overseas these days is that they have little credibility left in Israel. But abroad, these groups are still viewed as Israeli organizations representing an authentic Israeli perspective, and they also benefit from the NGO “halo effect.” That is why the transparency bill is so critical, and also why both the organizations and European governments are fighting so hard to kill it: Once these groups are required to state openly, on everything they do, that they’re primarily funded by European governments, it will be possible to expose them for what they really are – not independent Israeli NGOs with Israel’s best interests at heart, but agents of a hostile foreign power that is obsessed by Israel, discriminates against it and wishes it nothing but ill.

Evelyn Gordon..
Analyses from Israel..
22 January '16..

The global firestorm that has erupted over Israel’s “NGO transparency bill” can’t be understood without knowing one crucial fact: Israel’s leading left-wing “nongovernmental” organizations are actually wholly-owned subsidiaries of the European Union and its member states. This fact, which was incontrovertibly demonstrated by a new NGO Monitor study, explains both why the bill is so important and why it is so fiercely opposed by the organizations themselves and their European funders.

As I noted in Tuesday’s post, the study examined the financial reports filed with Israel’s registrar of nonprofit organizations by 27 prominent organizations from 2010-2014. The groups include B’Tselem, Breaking the Silence, Adalah, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel and many others actively engaged in trying to tarnish Israel’s name overseas. Overall, these groups raised more than 261 million shekels during those years; at current exchange rates, that comes to $66 million.

Of this total, fully 65 percent – some $43 million – came either directly or indirectly from foreign governments, primarily European ones. Foreign governments provided 20 of the 27 groups with over 50 percent of their funding, and three groups (Yesh Din, Terrestrial Jerusalem and Emek Shaveh) received over 90 percent of their funding from foreign governments. The largest donor was the EU, followed by Norway and Germany.

Moreover, this high level of European funding is absolutely unique, as demonstrated by a previous NGO Monitor report analyzing the years 2007-2010. That report found that the EU’s European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights spends more on promoting “democracy and human rights” in “Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories” than in every other country of the Mideast combined. Indeed, the EIDHR spends more in Israel alone – excluding all the grants given jointly to “Israel and the OPT” – than it does in every other Mideast country, every Asian and Pacific country, all but one African country and all but one American and Caribbean country; grants to “Israel and the OPT” together exceed those to every other country worldwide, by a very large margin.

The Big Problem Is the EU, Not the NIF - by Evelyn Gordon

...even if I’m wrong in my assessment of the NIF’s supporters, it’s hard to argue with the numbers. And those numbers lead to an unavoidable conclusion: Pro-Israel activists have been busy picking fights with fellow Jews when the real enemies are hostile foreign governments. By focusing so much of our ire on the NIF, we have effectively been giving the real culprits a pass. And it’s long past time for us to correct this error and start focusing our ire where it belongs – on the EU and its member states.

Evelyn Gordon..
Commentary Magazine..
19 January '16..

NGO Monitor has just published an important study of the funding of Israel’s premier left-wing “non-governmental” organizations. The first fact that arises from the study is no surprise to anyone who has been following the issue: Far from being “nongovernmental,” these groups are wholly-owned subsidiaries of the European Union and its member states. But the second fact did surprise me: The New Israel Fund, which has become the bête noire of pro-Israel activists both in Israel and abroad in recent years, is actually a comparatively minor donor to these groups. If it closed up shop tomorrow, its grantees would still manage just fine.

The study examined the funding of 27 organizations from 2010 to 2014, using the financial reports the groups filed with Israel’s registrar of nonprofit organizations. It also compiled a complete database of all donations to these groups during those years. The groups in question are the usual suspects, including B’Tselem, Breaking the Silence, Adalah, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel and many others whose main activity nowadays seems to be trying to tarnish Israel’s name overseas.

Overall, the report said, these groups raised more than 261 million shekels in 2010-2014; at current exchange rates, that comes to $66 million (all dollar conversions are my own). Of this, a whopping 65 percent – some $43 million – came from foreign governments (primarily European), either directly or indirectly.

Twenty of the 27 groups received more than 50 percent of their funding from foreign governments, and three of them – Yesh Din, Terrestrial Jerusalem, and Emek Shaveh – received over 90 percent of their funding from these governments. The largest governmental donor was the EU, followed by Norway and Germany.

Defending Israel against the EU’s ‘soft weapon’ - by Vic Rosenthal

...The ‘soft weapon’ of NGO money is wounding Israel no less than the suicide bombings of the Second Intifada. Like the security fence that stopped terrorist infiltration, we can build a legal fence against it. The squeals of those feeding at the trough of EU money must be ignored, and the Transparency Law passed by the Knesset.

Vic Rosenthal..
Abu Yehuda..
15 January '16..
Link: http://abuyehuda.com/2016/01/defending-israel-against-the-eus-soft-weapon/

When Israel built its security barrier back in 2003, the Palestinian Arabs and their supporters squealed like pigs. Despite numerous changes to its path to accommodate Arab complaints, some ordered by Israel’s Supreme Court, it became a cause célèbre for them, a symbol of alleged ‘apartheid’ and the focus of often violent demonstrations that continue to this day.

The reason is simple. The barrier stymied one of their best weapons, the suicide bombing. It’s often said that the Second Intifada was ended by Operation Defensive Shield, in which the IDF (despite the name) went on the offense against terrorist nests in places like Jenin and cleaned them out. But according to a member of the security forces who spent those dark months frantically racing from place to place to intercept human bombs before they could explode in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, the fence, while not impermeable, greatly reduced the number of possible entry points and made it much easier to stop them.

A similar situation exists today, as Israel moves to render one of our enemies’ most important ‘soft weapons’ impotent. I refer to the Transparency Law that is presently being considered in the Knesset to limit the ability of hostile foreign powers to conduct stealth delegitimization and demonization of Israel by funding Israeli non-governmental organizations. These NGOs, usually claiming to be ‘human rights’ groups, develop and disseminate tendentious data accusing Israel and the IDF of violations of international law and generally atrocious and ugly behavior.

For example, Breaking the Silence collects anecdotes from soldiers accusing the IDF of war crimes. But these stories often cannot be corroborated, are hearsay, exaggerated, or lack context. BTS refuses to give details to the IDF so they can be checked out and actual violations prosecuted. B’Tselem does the same with accusations that Israel violates the rights of Arabs in the territories, relying on one-sided testimony from Arabs and anti-Israel activists.

This material is then used as ‘evidence’ in dishonest legal proceedings against IDF soldiers and officers, and in UN reports and resolutions condemning Israel. It is used to turn popular opinion against her, so that the ‘international community’ and the US can pressure her for concessions to the Arabs and against muscular responses to terrorism and aggression. It is used as a justification for sanctions on Israel, such as the labeling of settlement products.

Every group that wants to attack Israel, from Students for Justice in Palestine to the Obama Administration, partakes of the false, exaggerated and context-free ‘facts’ created by these NGOs. In addition, the large anti-state community that is supported by this massive pot of foreign money is an internal political danger, and a challenge to Israel’s sovereignty.

Israel has only recently awakened to the damage that is being done to it on a daily basis. The dimensions of the enterprise are massive. Prof. Gerald Steinberg of NGO Monitor, which tracks foreign money in Israeli NGOs, notes that

The Obama administration’s most covert war - by Caroline Glick

The Obama Administration believes it is at war with Israel- not a shooting war, but a political war.

Caroline Glick..
Column One/JPost..
14 January '15..

Over the past several weeks, we have learned that the Obama administration believes it is at war with Israel. The war is not a shooting war, but a political war. Its goal is to bring the government to its knees to the point where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu loses power or begs Obama and his advisers to shepherd Israel through a “peace process” in which Israel will renounce its rights to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

One component of this war is espionage. Last month The Wall Street Journal reported that Israel is a top target for American espionage.

The other component of the administration’s war against Israel is political subversion. Over the past week, the administration has campaigned against the NGO bill sponsored by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked. If the bill, which was approved by the government, becomes law, it will require political NGOs that are principally financed by foreign governments to identify as foreign agents in their official communications and interactions.

Last week, State Department spokesman James Kirby lambasted the bill at an official briefing. Among other things, Kirby rejected Shaked’s claim that her bill is less restrictive than the US’s own Foreign Agents Registration Act. Kirby offered no substantiation of his claim.

Earlier this week, US Ambassador Dan Shapiro met with Shaked. Following their meeting, the US Embassy published two statements attacking the NGO law. In one of them, the embassy sought to substantiate Kirby’s claim regarding FARA. By the embassy’s telling, FARA relates only to agents whose action are directly guided by foreign governments, while Shaked’s NGO bill relates to entities that receive financing from foreign governments whether or not their actions are directed by the government financiers.

The embassy’s claim is deeply misleading.

As attorney Lorri Lowenthal Marcus explained this week in The Jewish Press, in practice, the burden of proof that US entities are not directed by foreign governments that fund them falls on the entities, not on the US government. In her words, the US law “uses ambiguous words and tests which are far more likely to lead to over-broad applications and chilling of speech than does the straightforward Israeli proposal’s standard.”

Moreover, whereas Shaked’s proposed NGO law would fine entities that fail to abide by reporting restrictions, under FARA, US entities that fail to abide by the restrictions of the law can face both fines and up to five years in prison.

The duplicitous nature of the administration’s assault on Shaked’s bill is all the more obvious when we consider how senior US officials view these politicized organizations.

Currently, the State Department is slowly fulfilling a federal court order to publish the emails Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton sent from her private email server during her tenure as secretary of state. Over the past several weeks, the department has published a number of emails regarding Israel that reveal the depth of hostility Clinton’s closest advisers harbored toward Israel.

Last week, one such email demonstrated that Clinton’s senior anti-Israel advisers viewed radical Israeli-registered NGOs as agents for the administration to use in order to carry out covert anti-Israel policies.

The email in question is a letter Clinton received in December 2011 from retired ambassador Thomas Pickering. Clinton asked her chief of staff to print out his letter.

Pickering’s illustrious career reached its peak during Bill Clinton’s administration. Clinton’s husband appointed Pickering, a former ambassador to Israel, to serve as undersecretary of state for policy planning, the third-most senior position at the State Department.

Pickering retired in 2001, at the end of the Clinton years. Since retiring, he has enjoyed the status of elder statesman among the American foreign policy elite. He has also been a loyal supporter and lobbyist for Iran, and a signatory on numerous plans to stick it to Israel.

In his letter to Clinton, Pickering recommended using leftist NGOs – including Peace Now, which he mentioned by name – to destabilize the political situation on the ground in Israel.

The French Consulate in Jerusalem and Breaking the Silence: Pourquoi? - by Gerald Steinberg

...The Israeli reactions to foreign-funded NGO warfare also highlight the secrecy which surrounds this funding, including the money for BtS provided by the French Consulate in Jerusalem. Who makes these decisions, and on the basis of which information, and for what objectives? Does any credible independent institution evaluate how this money is used or abused? Neither Israeli citizens, whose lives and safety are directly affected by such propaganda campaigns, nor French and European citizens who pay for them, have any idea about the answers to these questions. This lack of democratic transparency makes a mockery of moral justifications for funding Israeli groups like BtS.

Prof. Gerald Steinberg..
Times of Israel..
14 January '16..

Imagine a non-governmental organization (NGO) in France collecting anonymous testimonies from soldiers who fought in Mali, and accusing the French government of systematic war crimes. Now, add more funding from the European Union, and various other governments enabling the leaders of this fringe anti-France NGO to travel the world with exhibits claiming to demonstrate these war crimes, and cooperating with efforts to impose a punishing boycott on Paris.

For France, this scenario is entirely unrealistic. But if we change the focus to accusations to Israel, the absurd picture matches reality. In 2015, the French Consulate in Jerusalem provided the Israeli group “Breaking the Silence” (BtS) approximately 15,000 Euros.

BtS consists of a tiny group of Israelis who repeat anonymous “testimonies” (or make up their own, as shown in a few cases) in order to denounce the Israeli Defense Forces as war criminals. In recent months, BtS has unfurled its agenda in the European Parliament, in a Zurich church (a two week propaganda program with a photo exhibit and a continuous stream of anti- Israel speakers), a lecture to the British anti-Israeli group Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP), and elsewhere.

In general, foreign governments do not give taxpayer monies to a non-governmental organization (NGO) in another democracy to promote a particular political cause or lobby on legislation. However, Israel is an exception.

By channeling public funds to Breaking the Silence, the French Consulate in Jerusalem, as an arm of the Government of France, is directly facilitating and enabling a demonization campaign against another country that faces terror threats similar to those facing France.

The French government does not fund any groups making similar accusations against security forces involved in counter-terror operations in Paris, Brussels, London or elsewhere. And one can readily imagine the outrage if another country, for whatever reason, would fund a Breaking the Silence-type world tour claiming that France was committing war crimes in Mali or after the 13/11 terror attacks in Paris.

When NGO recipients of foreign funds do not have clean hands

...It needs no lessons in democracy from the U.S. or the Europeans. But it also has a right to worry about the way governments that are both hostile and supposedly friendly like Washington, are constantly seeking to intervene in Israeli politics without being held publicly accountable for what can only be considered plots to overturn the verdict of Israel’s voters. The more one delves into this topic, the more it is apparent that the NGOs that are the recipients of these foreign funds do not have clean hands. Neither do the governments that are working in the shadows to undermine the democracy they claim to support.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary Magazine..
12 January '16..

The press has continued to harp on the criticism being voiced by the Jewish left and the Obama administration of a proposed law that might bring more transparency to the funding of Israeli non-governmental organizations. The latest shot fired in the battle came from Dan Shapiro, the U.S. Ambassador to Israel, who issued a rare written statement about a meeting with Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, the prime sponsor of the controversial bill. Shapiro not only registered his disapproval of the bill but claimed Shaked was wrong to suggest that there was little difference between the legislation and U.S. law, which similarly requires transparency for those who operate as agents of foreign powers.

Shapiro’s arguments are misleading since there is nothing in the bill that actually limits the activities or even the ability of NGO’s to get their funding from invariably hostile foreign governments. Moreover, as even the Washington Post noted in a specious editorial denouncing the proposed law, the only tangible accomplishment of it will be to force lobbyists for such groups is to force them to wear a badge in the halls of the Knesset much like foreign agents do on Capitol Hill. But there is another aspect to this story that not only was ignored by the ambassador but which has failed to elicit any stories in the mainstream press, which has been so eager to highlight Shaked’s controversial bill as a threat to Israeli democracy.

As our Michael Rubin wrote on Friday, the left-wing Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that Ezra Nawi, a left-wing Israeli activist, hadn’t been merely hounding the Israeli Defense Forces and the West Bank settlement movement. He was caught on tape by undercover investigators boasting about his efforts trying to hinder land sales to Jews. More than that, he reported Arabs who were involved in selling land to Jews to the Palestinian Authority, which meant torture and certain death for those involved. The shocking indifference of the Israeli left to Palestinians victimized by the Fatah kleptocrats that rule both the West Bank and the Hamas terrorists that govern Gaza is not a secret. But acquiescence to the Palestinian movement’s deadly enforcement methods is something that shocked Israelis.

Israel's new NGO bill will reveal hidden agendas - by Emmanuel Navon

...If European governments want to influence Israel’s policies, they should do so via the accepted diplomatic channels. If they choose to hide their game, that game should be exposed. Under the proposed Israeli transparency bill, government-funded NGOs will continue to operate freely and to receive unlimited amounts of foreign donations. But those NGOs will now have to reveal up-front to Israeli elected officials the identity and agenda of their backers.

Dr. Emmanuel Navon..
Opinion/Newsweek..
10 January '16..

U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby has publicly rejected the comparison between the U.S. Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and a recently proposed Israeli bill on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) funded by foreign governments. Kirby, however, did not explain why he rejects such a comparison. He certainly knows why: There is no explanation. In fact, FARA is stricter than the proposed Israeli bill.

FARA requires agents who lobby on behalf of foreign governments to register with the Department of Justice, and to report their activities and finances. The purpose of FARA is to prevent the deception of U.S. lawmakers by lobbyists who actually act on behalf of foreign governments in order to influence U.S. policy making and legislation. Lobbyists who do not comply with FARA can be severely punished. In March 2012, for example, Kashmir-born U.S. lobbyist Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai was sentenced to two years of imprisonment by a U.S. court for not reporting a $3.5 million donation from the Pakistani government.

The proposed Israeli bill would require Israeli NGOs that receive more than half of their funding from “foreign political entities” (i.e., the European Commission and European governments) to make that information public whenever they lobby elected Israeli officials and whenever they publish their reports.

The proposed bill does not restrict the activities of NGOs, neither does it limit the amount of money they can receive from foreign governments. Rather, the bill enables lawmakers to know whether they are being lobbied by an organization acting on behalf of foreign governments. NGOs whose funding is mostly governmental can hardly claim to be “non-governmental” and to not promote the agenda of the governments that fund them.

In recent years, the extent of European meddling in Israeli politics via supposedly “non-governmental” organizations has reached unprecedented levels. Both the European Commission and European governments donate dozens of millions of euros every year to Israeli NGOs that influence Israel's decision-making and that affect Israel's international standing. Some of these NGOs are active in the BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanctions) campaign; some support the so-called Palestinian right of return (which is incompatible with the two-state solution); some petition Israel’s High Court of Justice to amend laws passed by the Knesset (Israel’s parliament).

Why is Israeli Democracy an Issue? - by Jonathan Tobin

...Friends of Israel should ignore the huffing and puffing about Shaked’s plan whether it comes from liberal editorial pages or the intemperate rants to be found at Haaretz. Those NGO’s are free to continue their activities, and nothing in the legislation will prevent them from doing so. But the key point to remember here is that the Israeli people have repeatedly rejected the left at the ballot box. What the left is trying to do with their current campaign is to undermine Israeli democracy, not save it.

Image by © GALI TIBBON / POOL/epa/Corbis

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary magazine..
06 January '16..

What explains the growing distress in the United States about a bill being debated in the Israeli Knesset? The controversial measure aims at forcing left-wing non-governmental agencies that get a majority of their funds from foreign governments and related agencies to essentially be labeled as foreign agents. The merits of the bill are, as I’ve written before, debatable, but the terms of that debate are predictably partisan as the country’s left-wing minority reflexively oppose any measure promulgated by the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu government. But as seems to happen with just about everything in Israel, minor kerfuffles are not only inflated into major issues out of all proportion to their actual importance. They also become excuses for foreign critics of the Jewish state to opine about its decline and eventual fall. No better example of this type of commentary can be found than a Washington Post editorial that ran last weekend about the NGO bill under the headline, “A danger to Israeli democracy.”

The piece follows the playbook being used by Netanyahu’s critics in which the bill is seen as not merely wrongheaded but an example of how the country’s center-right majority is eroding Israel’s democratic values. That’s become a staple of critiques of the Jewish state in recent years and has been sounded by left-wing groups like J Street and its cheerleaders in the press that believe Israel must be saved from itself. Such voices believe Zionism can only be rescued by foreign pressure that will force Israel to make more concessions to the Palestinians. More territorial withdrawals and the uprooting of West Bank settlements will, they think, magically create the peace the country needs. The fact that the Palestinians have repeatedly rejected offers of withdrawals and statehood in exchange for peace and that they used the Gaza withdrawal to create an independent state in all but name that is terrorist launching pad are treated as irrelevant. For the left, ideology trumps all, including such inconvenient facts that have led Israeli voters to elect Benjamin Netanyahu and his party in three consecutive elections with no end to their dominance of the country’s government in the foreseeable future.

Faced with a political position that seems to have made them a permanent minority since the collapse of Oslo, the left looks to its foreign cheerleaders to help them get their way. Part of that is in the form of pressure from the Obama administration that tried and failed to persuade the Palestinians to make peace with Israel. Part of it is the function of foreign governments that help fund left-wing groups including NGOs, whose primary purpose is to act as critics of the Israel Defense Forces as they seek to defend the country from yet another Palestinian terrorist offensive.

Squinting at Israeli Democracy, Washington Post Editorial Misses Target - by Eric Rozenman

Draconian, in light of some Israel-based NGOs' recurrent function as accomplices to anti-Israeli foreign funders? Or necessary, especially for a democracy under siege? Post readers deserved, but did not get, both sides of the story.

Eric Rozenman..
CAMERA Media Analyses..
05 January '16..

Israeli democracy—self-sabotaging or self-protecting? Those who read The Washington Post's editorial “A danger to Israeli democracy; Legislation on nongovernmental organizations should be shelved” (Jan. 3, 2016) might have been misled into believing the former.

According to The Post, legislation introduced by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked would punish NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that receive more than half their funding from “foreign government entities.” The bill would require them to report the sources of their money, identify themselves publicly as primarily foreign-supported and wear identification as to name and organization when present in the Knesset. Lobbyists already must comply with the latter, the newspaper concedes.

In The Post's opinion, approval of the legislation would parallel harsh restrictions on NGOs in Russia and China. “There, “dissent is being purposefully silenced….” The editorial writers assert that the Israeli bill “is aimed at delegitimizing progressive groups in Israel that have long been advocates for human rights and opposed to Jewish settlements in the West Bank, such as Peace Now, B'Tselem, the New Israel Fund and others.”

A week and a-half before The Post implicitly equated democratic Israel with dictatorial China and Russia, The Wall Street Journal published an Op-Ed headlined, “An Irresponsible Civil Society Harms Israel; Foreign influences push the Jewish state further toward pariah status” (Dec. 23, 2015). Written by Gerald M. Steinberg, president of Israel's NGO-Monitor and professor of international politics at Bar Ilan University, it provided information denied readers of “A danger to Israeli democracy”.

Steinberg argued that Shaked's bill “highlights some symbolic aspects” of the foreign-funded NGOs that essentially work to thwart policies of Israel's democratically-elected government. It “targets their legitimacy” since their major foreign support “is seen as an attack on Israel's national sovereignty….”

Unlike more restrictive proposals that may have prodded The Post, the justice minister's legislation “doesn't seek to limit the internal debate,” Steinberg wrote. “It only seeks to address the threat from the outside, via NGO campaigns of demonization and boycotts.”

Promoting democracy or undermining Israeli voters?

In an earlier commentary criticizing a different, more severe anti-NGO proposal, Steinberg wrote, “[L]arge-scale and unprecedented NGO funding from foreign governments to manipulate Israeli politics is a serious issue. When countries like Holland, Denmark or Germany use NGO funding instead of the accepted diplomatic channels for relations between states, they contribute to internal conflict, and undermine Israeli sovereignty.”
Asserting an “absence of transparency and independent evaluation in the transfer of European taxpayer budgets to such organizations,” Steinberg charged that “funds for NGOs operating under the façade of human rights are used to oppose peace efforts through such initiatives as the pro-BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) campaigns, and in some cases, endorse and promote antisemitic themes” (“The proposed ‘Agent Provocateur' law: Unjust and unjustified,” Times of Israel, December 16)

The NGO law protects Israel from existential threats by Ayelet Shaked

...Like the United States, we have discovered in recent years the danger posed by the existence of forces financed by foreign money. We have discovered that hundreds of millions of dollars are sent to NGOs in Israel from countries that seek to decide the existing dispute between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Often, those countries are not at all aware of the fact that the money they are sending is used by the bodies it is sent to for the purpose of weakening Israel’s moral claim and presenting it as a country that is prima facie committing a breach of international law.

Ayelet Shaked..
Times of Israel..
04 January '16..

JERUSALEM (JTA) — In 1914, Robert Frost published his poem “Mending Wall,” where he coined the maxim, “Good fences make good neighbors.” Those were the days of World War I, and it was perceived at that time that the best way to safeguard international relations and world peace was to clearly demarcate the physical borders between countries.

Two decades later, around the time of World War II, the concept of sovereignty had changed to include more than merely defending a country’s territory. The understanding that foreign governments were able to have a serious effect on a country’s internal decision-making led the United States to enact the Foreign Agents Registration Act in 1938, which requires non-diplomats representing foreign interests to register with the U.S. Department of Justice.

The act underwent a series of amendments during the 1960s, but the foundations upon which it was based and the justifications that formed its basis have not changed. A strong democracy cannot suffice itself with defending its physical borders alone, since threats to sovereignty are not always confined solely to tanks invading fields and cities. Sometimes the real threat lies in the interference in another country’s internal affairs. This is precisely the sort of interference that the 1945 U.N. Charter sought to confront.

A hundred years after Frost published his poem, there are about 2,000 lobbyists registered in the United States who represent the interests of “foreign political entities” and receive funding from them. The United States understood in time the importance of this identification of the foreign interests on behalf of whom the various organizations operate.

The Government Transparency Law that I am currently promoting is as its name says. It seeks to create transparency and clarity in relation to the parties financing Israeli NGOs who receive more than half of their annual budget directly from a foreign government. In no way does it prevent the activity of those NGOs, nor does it impose any restriction on their activities or forms of expression. In fact, the requirements it stipulates are much less stringent than those imposed by the United States upon similar types of activity under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.

Israel, which has been subject to an unending struggle for survival for almost 70 years, and where the state of emergency has not ceased for a single day since its establishment, deals with threats from near and far via the Israel Defense Forces. The security forces in Israel protect citizens night and day against the threats posed by enemy countries and the danger of terrorism. However, these dangers are not the only dangers that Israel has to deal with.

Currently, Israel is also fighting repeated attempts to undermine its very legitimacy. The BDS movement that is spreading all over the world presents itself as working against Israeli government policy, yet the official anti-Israeli sentiment it presents serves solely as a cover for the classic anti-Semitism that is only too well known. The same forces that in the Europe of the 1930s and ’40s cried “Jews – go to Palestine,” are now calling out to Israeli citizens: “Jews – go back to Europe.”

The New NGO Law and Why the Israeli Left Fears It - by Matan Peleg

...Simply stated, democracies have the right, indeed the obligation, to protect themselves. The proposed Israeli law is just such a protection....The law applies to any NGO that receives foreign government funding. (The fact that the only NGOs receiving such funding are left-wing ones bears out the fear of why that money is being given in the first place. No money is being given to groups that support the state, only those that stand in active opposition to it.)

Matan Peleg..
The Algemeiner..
03 January '15..

The shrill reaction to the proposed NGO law in Israel is hardly unexpected. It is consistent with the reflexive reaction to any perceived incursion on the monopoly that the Israeli Left believes itself entitled to.

Whether it is holding themselves out as the only guardians of human rights, or the truest patriots because of their self-conceived courage in confronting the institutions of the state, the Left has long believed that it should be accorded great respect and unencumbered flexibility in how it conducts itself.

For a long time, the citizens of Israel fell into line and acted accordingly. But something tectonic has taken place in Israel, and the Left ignores this at its peril. What has changed is that there has been an awakening to the relationship that Left-wing NGOs, whose mission is to demean and de-legitimize the state of Israel, have with foreign governments — mostly in Europe.

That relationship is based on financing. Lots of it.

Israelis intuitively know that this threatens our self-determination and even sovereignty. Why? Because foreign governments are players seeking to change Israeli policy concerning the Palestinians, as they seek to further the Palestinian agenda.

Foreign governments can influence world bodies, other governments, trade relationships and a whole host of geopolitical issues that private donors to NGOs — no matter how wealthy or influential — cannot hope to match.

So when a law is proposed that would require an NGO receiving significant foreign funding to identify itself as working on behalf of that government, most Israelis believe this to be reasonable, justified and not an incursion on the operational freedom of NGOs.

Rather, the opinion of most Israelis matches that of the US Supreme Court, which has opined that “democracy is not a suicide pact.” Simply stated, democracies have the right, indeed the obligation, to protect themselves. The proposed Israeli law is just such a protection.