Update: this action, now closed, ran in January 2016.
Israel is on the verge of adopting an openly anti-democratic law seeking to stigmatize, delegitimize, and ultimately silence Israeli non-governmental organizations (NGOs) like Peace Now.
On January 6, 2016, APN hosted Professor Mordechai Kremnitzer of the Israel Democracy Institute for a conversation on the current state of Israeli democracy, as it faces new government measures to enhance the Netanyahu government’s hegemony and to stifle dissent.
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Professor Mordechai Kremnitzer is Vice President of Research at the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) and Professor Emeritus at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Faculty of Law, where he served as Dean. He is an expert on criminal, military, and public law, and widely considered as a leading expert on Israeli democracy and democracy education. At the IDI, he has been leading the following projects: Constitutional Principles and their Implementation, National Security and Democracy, Arab-Jewish Relations, and Proportionality in Public Policy.
Secular Revolutions and Religious Counter-Revolutions:
The Case of Zionism
Wednesday, February 3, 2016, 7:30pm - 9:00pm
A program of the Foundation for Jewish Studies
Kol Shalom, Co-Sponsor
Kol Shalom, Co-Sponsor
APN Board Member Professor Michael Walzer will speak about the years after WWII as
three secular, leftist national liberation movements in Israel, India and Algeria succeeded in winning
independence and establishing states.
News from Peace Now's (Israel) Settlement Watch:
94% of the donations of 9 well-known right-wing NGOs are nontransparent
In light of the NGO bill, a Peace Now study examining the funding sources and transparency of 9 right-wing pro-settler NGOs finds that 94% of the donations to these organizations in the years 2006-2013 were nontransparent, meaning that there is no possibility to identify their original donor. The study also finds that the majority of the funding to the organizations examined originated from private individuals abroad, arriving mainly through U.S. organizations with a tax-deductible donations status. Many other millions of shekels originated from Israeli taxpayers' money through government ministries and an local municipalities.
Peace Now: The NGO bill, also known as the "transparency bill" has nothing to do with transparency and
everything to do with the delegitimation of organizations criticizing the government's policies. If the Minister of
Justice is truly interested in transparency, she must first and foremost promote legislation requiring right-wing
organizations to expose the millions they receive from private donors abroad and from the state budget.
ISRAEL, SURROUNDED not only by threats to its existence but also by governments and movements that practice tyranny, is a stubbornly free society.
This week, Alpher discusses what we can expect in Israel and Israel-US relations in 2016; the notion that the Palestinian issue increasingly will become an internal Israeli affair; how the Arab and Muslim worlds will respond to this and if we will witness external aggression against Israel; and prospects for some sort of international political agreement regarding Syria, spearheaded by the US and Russia
What is the bill? What does the bill say?
NOTE: This post was updated on January 21, 2016, to reflect changes introduced to the draft bill, as submitted by the cabinet to the Knesset on January 18, 2016. The language of the bill (Hebrew) can be found here.
The bill’s official title is “Amendment to Bill on disclosure regarding those supported by a foreign political entity (Increasing transparency for those supported mainly by foreign political entities)." It is also known by its backers as the “Transparency Bill.” The bill is an amendment to an existing 2011 law, which determines the disclosure requirements of Israeli non-profit, non-governmental organizations (NGOs or NPOs) that receive funding from “Foreign Political Entities” (foreign governments, the European Union or the United Nations).
The Israeli government’s gift to Washington this holiday season was the gift of occupation.
Literally so. You may have missed the story because of the holiday, but shortly before Christmas, Benjamin
Netanyahu’s ambassador to Washington, Ron Dermer, proudly announced that this year, instead of sending products
made in Israel to American friends, he is breaking with tradition and sending gift boxes containing
products made exclusively in settlements in the occupied territories.
Allegedly, this was intended as a message to those who call for punitive economic measures against Israel (ironically, it plays into their hands), but it clearly was aimed at the Obama administration’s rejection of Netanyahu’s settlement policies. Another Netanyahu finger in the eye of an American administration that had the audacity to attempt to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
News from Peace Now's (Israel) Settlement Watch:
This Monday (December 28, 2015) data from the latest Settlement Watch report was published as the main headline
of the
Haaretz Newspaper. The report, which was based on a freedom of information petition, exposed that the
Ministry of housing is working on plans for 55,000 housing units in the settlements, over 8000 of them in E1.
These findings also received significant international press coverage, including in the New York Times and the
Washington Post. For the full report
click here.
Due to our exposure, yesterday (December 29, 2015) Prime Minister Netanyahu renounced the plans for E1, arguing that these were done by former Minister Uri Ariel at his own initiative without the required authorization. Netanyahu also stated that the plans "have no standing and are non-binding." For a report on Netanyahu's response to the data we uncovered see this article in Ynetnews.
Due to our exposure, yesterday (December 29, 2015) Prime Minister Netanyahu renounced the plans for E1, arguing that these were done by former Minister Uri Ariel at his own initiative without the required authorization. Netanyahu also stated that the plans "have no standing and are non-binding." For a report on Netanyahu's response to the data we uncovered see this article in Ynetnews.
Washington, DC – Americans for Peace Now (APN) is alarmed by new evidence, exposed today by our Israeli sister organization Peace Now, indicating that the Israeli government is planning massive new settlement construction in the West Bank, including in an area known as “E-1” adjacent to East Jerusalem. Settlement construction in E-1 would likely be a death blow to the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It has therefore been consistently and vehemently opposed by both Republican and Democratic administrations, and by the international community.
The new evidence, some 200 pages Peace Now obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, shows that for the past year, Israel’s Ministry of Housing has been actively working outside of the public's eye to advance plans for 55,548 new homes in West Bank settlements.