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[Excerpts:]

"“The legislation is designed to be similar to the U.S. Foreign Agents Registration Act, which means that organizations that get money from foreign governments – many of them get most of their money from Europeans – will have to make it public at the time they get it,” said Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor. He said this has become such a “hot issue” in Israel “because of the intense role of [some of] these organizations in the campaign” to encourage divestment from Israel. “Some of these organizations were active on 20 campuses in Canada and the U.S. during [the recent] Israel Apartheid Week,” Steinberg said. “They were funded both by European governments and the New Israel Fund [NIF].”" "Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said “most serious people have a right to expect that groups that distribute funds in Israel like the NIF have standards for those they give money to, like not advocating violence.” But he said he is against countries trying to change the policy of another by funding groups whose views they support. “If governments want to see change in Israel, they should try to initiate that change through diplomacy,” Foxman said. “Every country sets bilateral agreements about how they relate to each other. If Israel decided it didn’t like the sexual equality laws of Norway and then funded organizations there that opposed those laws, it would be overstepping its diplomatic role. It’s one thing to support a library and bring in cultural events. But what if tomorrow Norway didn’t like that Israel has a rabbinate. Is it going to fund a secular movement? That’s interference in the internal affairs of a country.”"