Ma'an Development Center

Activities

• Main office located in Ramallah. Branches in Gaza, Khan Younis, Tulkarem, and Jenin.
• According to its website, Ma’an’s work is “informed by the necessity of creating independent, self-reliant initiatives that lead to the development of human resources for sustainable development, which incorporate values of self-sufficiency and self-empowerment.”
• Ma’an’s mission is to “partner and work hand in hand with Palestinian NGOs” towards sustainable human development through: development of Palestinian human resources, institutional building, conducting developmental research, and creating sustainable agricultural models.

Ties to the PFLP

• In May 2018, Ma’an Development Center employee Ahmad Abdallah Aladini was killed in the violence on the Gaza border. Aladini was a “comrade” of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a terrorist organization designated as such by the US, EU, Canada, and Israel. According to the PFLP, Aladini was active against the “Zionist aggression on the Gaza Strip.”
  • On his Facebook page, Aladini posted images that glorify violence and terrorists, including PFLP propaganda. On May 7, 2018, Aladini posted a PFLP memorial notice for the death of six members of Hamas who were killed during the “crimes of the Zionist enemy.”
  • On May 15, 2018, Ma’an Development Center posted on Facebook a memorial notice for Aladini, referring to him as a “colleague and martyr.” (Ma’an has since removed the post.)

Anti-Israel Activities

• Ma’an Development Center cooperates with the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). EAPPI sends volunteers to the West Bank to “witness life under occupation”; upon their return, many of these volunteers promote BDS in their home countries.
  • In 2015, Ma’an Development Center, EAPPI, East Jerusalem YMCA, and the Palestinian Center for Democracy and Conflict Resolution (PCDCR) received $287,323 from Norway for a project  titled “Protecting access to Education in oPt through violations immediate response.”
• Accuses Israel of “war crimes” and violating international law. Refers to Gaza as the “world’s largest open-air prison,” and accuses Israel of denying citizens of “basic human rights such as water and electricity.”
• The security barrier is consistently referred to as the “Apartheid Wall” and the section that surrounds Qalqilya is described “[a]s a control mechanism,” which “takes on the form of an enclosed cage in this area, transforming it into an open-air prison.”
• Published “Boycotts, Divestment & Sanctions: Lessons learned in effective solidarity” (2009), a guide to grassroots and international BDS campaigns.
• According to Ma’an Development Center, normalization with Israel encompasses: “…Projects implying equity between Israelis and the Palestinians in the responsibility for the conflict, or that claim that peace is achieved through dialogue and understanding and increased cooperation between both sides, without achieving justice; Projects that hide the situation of the Palestinian people as victims of the Israeli colonial project; Projects supported by or in partnership with the Israeli institutions that do not recognize the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people or projects receiving support or funding (in part or in whole) from the Israeli government such as cinema festivals, information technology exhibitions, etc.”
• MA’AN’s publication, “2017 Diary,” blamed Israel for the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and provides legitimacy to Hamas’ rule, referring to it as having been elected through “democratic elections,” blaming Israel for “Palestinian internal division,” and having “intentionally crippled and undermined a functioning and sovereign state.” The document makes no mention of that fact that Hamas is designated a terrorist organization by the U.S., Canada, the EU, and Israel.
• On November 9, 2017, Ma’an Development Center was a signatory on a call to support “A World Without Walls,” drawing comparisons between “Israel’s apartheid wall on Palestinian land to the US wall of Shame on indigenous land at the border with Mexico.”
• On August 8, 2014, Ma’an Development Center was a signatory on a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressing its disappointment with his “failure” to point out the “Palestinians legitimate and legal right to resist occupation, colonization and institutionalized discrimination” and his “inappropriate justification of Israel’s violations of international humanitarian law, which amount to war crimes.”
• During a July 2, 2011 hearing of the Australian Senate’s Foreign Affairs, Defence, and Trade Legislation Committee, Senator Eric Abetz asked officials from the Australian Agency for International Development questions regarding funding to Ma’an Development Center.
  • “What are the safeguards in place that prevent AusAID funding being used by APHEDA [‘overseas humanitarian aid agency of the Australian Council of Trade Unions’] or any of the others in a manner that contravenes Australian government policy on Israel? Let us just pluck an example out of the air like BDS—Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions.”
  • Senator Abetz continued by identifying indirect Australian government funding via APHEDA for Ma’an Development Center, which “is heavily involved in the BDS [anti-Israel boycotts, divestment, and sanctions] campaign… On their website the Ma’an Development Center published a guide to grassroots and international BDS campaigns in 2009… and it is quite clear that the ACTU and APHEDA have no difficulty with the BDS campaign.” (Following an October 2010 hearing, where these issues were first raised, AusAid stated that “Ma’an Development Centre received approximately $1,219,320 from Union Aid Abroad-APHEDA in the 12 months to 30 April 2010.”)
  • At the same time, these organizations did not repudiate their involvement in BDS activities. APHEDA and Ma’an argued that “Palestinian civil society organisations are significant forces for democratisation, and should be free to adopt and voice policies and advocacy positions,” and that “Decisions on project funding should be made only on merit – on whether the projects are achieving the results that are contracted – rather than external political criteria.”
• In 2010, Ma’an Development Center published a report titled: “Eye on the Jordan Valley”, alleging that “Israel has continually coveted the Jordan Valley since the 1967 war” and that “the Jordan Valley is suffering from serious social, environmental and economic devastation as a consequence of Israel’s apartheid policies.” This report was funded by Cordaid (Netherlands)/
• In a “Case Study” on a Qalqilya farmer, as well as in other such “case studies,” Ma’an Development Center refers to Israeli “colonization,” and Israeli governments are described as “consecutive occupation governments since 1948.” It contains “testimony” from a local farmer, accusing Israel of “the atrocity of the occupation cutting off human finger in order to capture the necessary fingerprints.”