Background

The European Union has been funding politicized Israeli NGOs for many years, and NGO Monitor analysis has shown that the EU was the single largest state donor to these groups in 2012-2014. Most of the grantees are closely linked, often sharing board members and officials. In addition, there is a clear case of “double dipping” – two EU grants for essentially the same project to the same organization.

Grants

As seen on the Europeaid website, since November 2015, seven new grants, amounting to €1.9 million, have been given by the EU to the following NGOs (all are part of the New Israel Fund network):

  • Baladnarefers to the establishment of the State of Israel as “Nakba” (catastrophe) and encourages Israeli Arab youth to refuse to serve in the IDF or do national service. Received €244,371 for “promoting and protecting freedom of expression rights of Arab youth in Israel.”
  • Emek Shaveh – highly politicized NGO, alleges that Israeli archeological excavations marginalize Palestinians’ connection to the land, while omitting Muslim excavations that attempted to erase Jewish history from Temple Mount. Emek Shaveh activist Yonathan Mizrachi has compared Israeli archeological excavations to Hamas terror tunnels. Received €240,000 for “lands and cultural heritage rights in area C of the West Bank.”
  • SikkuyReceived €250,000 for “advancing equality in government budgets and resource allocations to the Arab Bedouin citizens in the unrecognized/recently recognized villages in the Negev.”
  • HaMoked – regularly petitions the High Court of Justice and makes inaccurate and inflammatory allegations of Israeli “apartheid,” “deportations,” “torture,” and “forcible transfers.” Received €204,576 for “youth in detention: preventing mistreatment of detained Palestinian minors in East Jerusalem.”
  • Association for Human Rights in Israel (ACRI) – Received €253,289 for “freedom of speech and combatting hate speech in Israel.”
  • Adam Institute for Democracy and Peace received €250,000 in August 2015 for the project “words matter: educating about and for freedom of expression.” This project is a joint activity with ACRI, which as noted above received another grant for almost the exact same objective, for an overlapping time period. ACRI’s participation is not mentioned on Europeaid’s webpage on this grant.
  • Itach Ma’aki (Women Lawyers for Social Justice), received €476,108 starting February 2016. Although the majority of the activity of this NGO does not concern the Arab-Israeli conflict, its list of board members reveals a close affinity to the NGOs listed above, as well as other highly politicized Israeli NGOs:
    • Itach-Maaki board member Prof. Neta Ziv practiced as a public interest lawyer for ACRI between 1986-1996 and served as Vice President of The New Israel Fund (NIF) between 2000-2010.
    • Itach-Maaki board member Adv. Susan Zohar is also a member of the legal department of Adalah, an NIF and EU grantee, which uses invented and distorted legal claims to demonize Israel, and accuses it of racism, “war crimes” and other violations of international law. Adalah opposes Israel’s right to define itself as a Jewish state..
    • Itach-Maaki board member Rachel Benziman worked as executive director of ACRI.
    • Itach-Maaki board member Henriette Dahan-Kalev served as board member and chairwoman of B’Tselem, another NIF and EU grantee. Dahan-Kalev is also a board member of the Alternative Information Center (AIC), a fringe NGO that promotes BDS and regards Israel as an apartheid state.
    • HaMoked founder and board member Yosef Schwartz is also a board member at AIC, and serves as consultant to the NIF.