Kerem Navot

Profile

Country/TerritoryIsrael
Websitehttp://www.keremnavot.org/english
Founded2012
In their own words"Israeli civil society organization, established during 2012 and employing comprehensive land-use research to challenge the systems and policies that enable ongoing dispossession of Palestinians from their land in the West Bank."

Funding

Activities

  • According to a 2013 article in the Times of Israel, the name of the organization, “Kerem Navot, or Navot’s Vineyard….a barbed biblical citation, might go over the head of the average Israeli — but not over that of members of the religious settler movement, at whom it is aimed.”
  • In January 2023, Kerem Navot referred to Israeli “settlers” as “exemplary citizens of the apartheid republic of Israel.”
  • In August 2022, Kerem Navot was a signatory on a statement condemning the decision by the Israeli Ministry to designate six Palestinian NGOs as terrorist organizations.  According to the statement, “We stand in solidarity with our fellow human rights defenders in Palestinian society. We repudiate these baseless declarations and call on the international community to pressure Israel to revoke its decision.”
  • In March 2022, Kerem Navot founder Dror Etkes drew false equivalencies between Russia/Ukraine and Israel stating that “War in Ukraine = continued violent takeover of the West Bank.”
  • In April 2021, Kerem Navot was recognized for its contributions in the acknowledgements section of Human Rights Watch’s report that denied Israel’s legitimacy as a Jewish state by alleging Israel has committed crimes of apartheid and reduced all security policies to “demographic objectives.”
  • In March 2021, Kerem Navot and B’Tselem published “This Is Ours – And This, Too” accusing Israel of “appear[ing] more determined than ever to continue upholding and perpetuating an apartheid regime throughout the area under its control.” The report was funded by the government of Norway.
  • In August 2020, Kerem Navot referred to the Shahak Industrial Park (in the Northern West Bank) as “A park that promotes apartheid.”
  • In March 2019, Kerem Navot published a report on “Israeli land seizures” in the West Bank stating it is part of Israel’s “political interest of Judaizing large parts of the West Bank.”
  • In February 2019, Kerem Navot accused Israel of exploiting natural resources, stating that “Israel loots the West Bank in violation of international law, which prohibits the occupying state from using natural resources in occupied territory to aid its economy, solely allowing it to make use of them for the benefit of the local population.”
  • In January 2019, Amnesty International published a report on the “The Tourism Industry and Israeli Settlements,” which relied on materials from Kerem Navot. The report denied Jewish connections to historical sites and faults Israel for preserving Jewish historical and cultural heritage, as well as places that are holy to Christians.
  • In December 2018, Kerem Navot, in cooperation with Human Rights Watch, published a report titled “Bed and Breakfast on Stolen Land: Tourist Rental Listings in West Bank Settlements” that was the culmination of a two-year long coordinated and well-financed BDS campaign targeting Airbnb (and Booking.com). The report contained numerous false claims regarding the legal and human rights responsibility of Airbnb in allowing Israelis from the West Bank to list their properties, as well as questionable methodology.
  • In May 2018, Kerem Navot published a report accusing Israel of “enforc[ing] a sweeping policy of preventing Palestinians from accessing their lands located adjacent to settlements.”
  • In December 2016, in response to claims that a school in the West Bank was constructed illegally on private land, Dror Etkes, founder of Kerem Navot, said, “It’s no wonder that while Israel’s racist education minister in busy trying to find ways to make vermin like the Amona outpost kosher and to initiate laws meant to silence organizations such as Breaking the Silence…” (emphasis added).
  • In October 2016, Kerem Navot released a report on FIFA and Israeli football clubs in the West Bank urging FIFA “not to accept football clubs that play on stolen land, and to suspend their participation in the Israeli football association.”
  • In August 2013, Kerem Navot published a report titled “Israeli Settler Agriculture as a Means of Land Takeover in the West Bank” that accused Israel repeatedly of “aggressive takeovers,” employing “land-grab methods,” and an almost “complete lack of law enforcement against settlers who infiltrate and expropriate private Palestinian land and harass Palestinian farmers in blatant violation even of Israeli law.”

Staff

  • Dror Etkes
    • Founder of Kerem Navot, Etkes previously worked at Peace Now and Yesh Din heading settlement tracking projects.
    • According to the Belgian government, Etkes provided “technical assistance” to the PA and the Norwegian Refugee Council. Etkes is referred to as providing expertise in “land data collection, mapping, cartographic analysis, accessing governmental information and documenting changes in human settlements and patterns of land usage through the use of photographic and other informational evidence. This technical expertise is key to the success of many of the HLP cases and is regularly cited by the PA and lawyers as some of the most valuable information they receive.”
    • In August 2017, Etkes tweeted a picture of a pizza store in the West Bank, referring to it as “a kosher pizza with an extra apartheid spice.”
  • Shay Davidovich, formerly of Breaking the Silence, is Kerem Navot’s communications officer. Davidovich is also a communications officer at the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI).

Foreign donations based on financial reports submitted to the Israeli Registrar of Non Profits (amounts in NIS)

2018-2019 amounts based on NGO annual financial reports; 2020-2022 amounts based on quarterly financial reports submitted to the Israeli Registrar of Non-Profits.

Donor20222021202020192018
Broederlijk Delen (Belgium)51,22050,44043,730
Diakonia (Sweden)38,39076,23666,55624,55890,882
Medico International (Germany)68,00056,70060,30057,45063,453
Rosa Luxembourg Foundation (Germany)38,50039,20039,10546,85651,219
Haqel128,35029,67434,41423,398

All Articles about Kerem Navot