NIF Smears NGO Monitor to Avoid BDS Responsibility

PRESS RELEASE May 13, 2011 Contact: Jason Edelstein NGO Monitor (02) 566-1020 972-52-861-2129 mail@ngo-monitor.org

NIF Smears NGO Monitor to Avoid BDS Responsibility JERUSALEM - Following exposure of NIF's central role in funding BDS activities of the Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP), the New Israel Fund (NIF) on May 12 issued a statement falsely claiming that NGO Monitor "knowingly published false information." NGO Monitor notes that NIF continues to avoid its responsibility and to misrepresent facts regarding its funding of CWP - specifically the group's "Who Profit's" BDS campaign - and has resorted to uncivil smear tactics, including grossly distorting the conversation between Prof. Steinberg and Rachel Liel. The most recently available public NIF grant information shows CWP received nearly $300,000 from 2006-2009. In addition to this grant, CWP's website continues to state that NIF accepts tax-exempt donations in the U.S., UK, and Switzerland on their behalf and on behalf of the "Who profits?" project. NIF still has not published its 2010-2011 grant information. "Clearly NIF officials belatedly realize that they are responsible for very costly mistakes in funding the leaders of the BDS and demonization campaigns," says Prof. Gerald Steinberg, president of NGO Monitor. "We hope that as part of accepting NGO Monitor's guidelines for ethical funding, the NIF will publish all of its grant information in a timely manner. It is important to verify that both direct and indirect funding for groups such as the CWP has indeed ended, and that the NIF join in publically denouncing this immoral activity. We also urge NIF to end the uncivil attacks that seek to silence this important discussion. As the CWP and other examples show, NIF officials and donors often do not understand the implications of the organization's own funding and activities." Prof. Steinberg's letter to Dr. Cherny regarding NIF. ###

May 12, 2011 Report on CWP: "Who Profits" from the BDS Campaign? Review of Coalition of Women for Peace Coalition of Women for Peace, which receives tax-deductible donations via the New Israel Fund (NIF) in the US, UK, and Switzerland, is one of the leading organizations in the global BDS (boycotts, divestment, and sanctions) campaign against Israel. NGO Monitor's analysis shows: Israeli NGO, the Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP), describes itself as a "feminist organization against the occupation of Palestine and for a just peace." It has ten constituent member organizations. Funded directly and indirectly by the governments of Switzerland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Germany; the New Israel Fund; aid organizations such as Oxfam Novib, SIVMO, and Kvinna Till Kvinna; and private individuals. This funding is used by CWP to promote global campaigns to de-legitimize Israel under the Durban strategy, including "Israel Apartheid Week," anti-Israeli rallies, the "Free Gaza Movement"; targeting Israel in the UN; lobbying the British Government on prosecution of "Israeli War Criminals" (lawfare); and hosting related events and lectures. CWP is a leader in the boycotts, divestments, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. With radical allies such as "Code Pink," it advocates boycotting products from all of Israel, not restricted to the "occupied territories." Campaigns include the UC Berkeley divestment effort (2010), the Norwegian Government's Pension Fund which led to divestment from Elbit, and targeting of banks, security companies, civil infrastructure facilities, and private firms. CWP's flagship BDS project "Who Profits?" is an online database initiated "in response to the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) on Israel," and "a key asset to the global movement of economic activism and BDS." Related activities: Events marking the anniversary of the Palestinian "Naqba" on Israel's Independence Day, staging the antisemitic play "Seven Jewish Children - A Play for Gaza," and supporting Israelis who refuse IDF service. Uses inflammatory rhetoric that erases the conflict framework: i.e., "ethnic segregation between Palestinians and Jews in the occupied West Bank." CWP representatives participated at a divestment rally in Brussels where one leader drank fake blood out of a wine glass - an apparent reference to the libel of Jews drinking Christian blood as wine - to highlight Israel's alleged brutality. Click here for the full report mail@ngo-monitor.org www.ngo-monitor.org

Technorati Tag: Israel.