Mar 30, 2013
30 March 2013
Stop the JNF UK
On 30 March 1976, thousands of Palestinians living as a minority in Israel mounted a general strike and organised protests against Israeli government plans to expropriate almost 15,000 acres of Palestinian land in the Galilee. The Israeli government, led by prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and defence minister Shimon Peres, sent in the army to break up the general strike. The Israeli army killed six unarmed Palestinians, wounded hundreds and arrested hundreds more, including political activists. All were citizens of Israel.
Palestinians who were internally displaced or managed to remain in their homes during the Zionist ethnic cleansing of 1948 were given citizenship of Israel but kept under military rule until 1966. During those years expropriation of Palestinian land accelerated and Jewish settlement building increased while the Israeli government crushed political organisation and resistance by Palestinians, now a minority on their own land.
On what became known as Land Day, 30th March 1976 was the first time since 1948 Palestinians inside Israel demonstrated mass resistance against Zionist colonisation and systematic dispossession of Palestinians.
Today, Palestinians are 20% of the population of Israel and they, together with Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, continue to struggle against land expropriation, dispossession and systematic segregation, or apartheid. Until today the Israeli government with the help of Zionist organisations such as the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Fund (JNF) are working to drive Palestinians from their homes and their land to replace them with Jewish settlers and colonies. The JNF is a racist organisation that is complicit in ethnic cleansing and whose activities are an obstacle to a just peace.
The JNF branch in the UK has registered charity status despite JNF UK aims and activities violating charity law and the public benefit requirement. While we send our greetings of solidarity on Land Day to Palestinians protesting and in struggle against the colonisation and occupation of their lands, it is important we work here to end JNF UK charity status.
Mar 29, 2013
To mark the 37th anniversary of Land Day, the Baladna Association for Arab Youth has released an infographic poster about the racist Prawer Plan which aims at the confiscation of the lands and the displacement of the Arab Bedouins in unrecognized (by the government) Naqab villages .
Poster created and designed by Nayif Shaqur
Mar 23, 2013
by Susan Landau, Philly BDS
Original posting on Modoweiss
“Ethnic cleansing is a crime – justice now in Palestine!” Chanting with great energy and exuberance, the Philadelphia Coalition for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel (Philly BDS) was once again a colorful and vocal presence in protest at the annual local fundraiser for The Jewish National Fund.
This year’s JNF fundraiser, “March Madness Poker Tournament” was held in the Philadelphia neighborhood of Manayunk on Thursday, March 21. Under the banner “STOP THE JNF’s APARTHEID ROYALE,” members of Philly BDS and allies costumed themselves as playing cards bearing the words “Stop the JNF!” Carrying signs reinforcing their message “Land Theft is not Charity,” protesters positioned themselves strategically on both sides of the driveway entrance to the event. Informational postcards and conversation were available to attendees and passers-by.
The demonstration called attention to the role of the Jewish National Fund in ethnically cleansing indigenous 
Palestinians from their homes. Since 1948, the JNF was re-branded as an environmental organization focused on forestation, while inflicting environmental devastation through fires, bulldozers, and pesticides in order to cover up Palestinian history. Each year, the JNF raises over $60 million in the United States alone. Despite its role in ethnic cleansing and apartheid, the JNF continues to enjoy charitable status.
“Protesting the JNF makes a slam dunk case for apartheid within Israel,” said Nathaniel Miller, longtime activist and founding member of Philly BDS. “Acquiring land and property rights exclusively for Jewish Israelis is an unambiguous example of Israeli apartheid and makes the case for the need to respond to the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel. Philly BDS challenges the JNF to end its racist policies. We are committed to ending the occupation, full equality for all people of Israel-Palestine, and the Right of Return for refugees.”
Today’s protest is in support of the international “Stop the JNF” campaign that has been gaining ground in the UK, Europe and elsewhere. “We must work to revoke the tax-exempt charitable status of the JNF,” adds Miller.
The chanting continues non-stop, “Bulldozing homes, stealing land- it’s all part of the JNF plan!”
The Philly BDS consumer boycott targeting Sabra Hummus and Tribe Hummus is directly connected to the JNF. Tribe Hummus is owned by Osem foods, a company that contributes its profits to the Jewish National Fund. Since launching its campaign targeting Sabra Hummus and Tribe Hummus in October 2010, Philly BDS continues to stand for justice with Palestinians by responding to the 2005 Call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel until it meets it obligations under international law.
Mar 23, 2013
In the United States, the Internal Revenue Service (the “IRS”) may grant federal tax-exempt status to certain organizations that are organized and operated exclusively for exempt purposes such as, among others, charitable, religious or educational purposes. Just as the IRS grants, so can the IRS take away, or revoke, an organization’s tax-exempt status. Organizations may lose their tax-exempt status for various reasons, including if the organization:
- is not organized and operated exclusively for exempt purposes,
- engages in deceptive or improper fundraising practices or
- operates contrary to the United States’ public policy. An organization operates contrary to the United States’ public policy if, for example, the organization’s activities are racially exclusive or discriminatory, increase neighborhood tensions, increase prejudice and discrimination or undermine human and civil rights.
On all of these accounts, the JNF is not an organization that warrants tax-exemption. Yet the JNF raises over $50 million per year in the United States alone and reaps the benefits of a tax-exempt organization. Therefore, Stop the JNF is requesting that the IRS investigate and, based on the existing evidence, revoke the JNF’s charity status.
Complete the petition form below to send a letter to the IRS to help us challenge the JNF’s tax-exempt status in the United States.
You can also download, print this letter and send to the IRS: [wpdm_file id=20]
Download the petition to the IRS: [wpdm_file id=21]
Signature sheets: [wpdm_file id=22]
Note: the letter should be signed by US residents only. To prevent spam you will be asked to confirm your email address before your letter is sent to the IRS.
[emailpetition id=”1″]
Mar 22, 2013
On Thursday 21st March, International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, Palestine solidarity activists handed over a copy of the Stop the JNF application to the Charity Commission to remove JNF UK charities from the register.
Liverpool
On Thursday 21st March a delegation of twelve people mostly from Liverpool Friends of Palestine gathered together on Princes’ Parade. Their aim was to hand in a document to the Charity Commission.
Similar delegations were at Charity Commission offices at Taunton, London and Newport.
Newport
Palestine supporters from South Wales presented several petitions to Harry Iles at the Charity Commission offices in Newport on Thursday, as part of a nationwide campaign to call for the racist JNF to have its UK charity status revoked. We were welcomed into the offices by Mr Iles who had been expecting us and invited to state our position. We did so briefly and were told that our submission would be considered by the CC lawyers and that we were welcome to add any further material like JNF fundraising leaflets to our petition if we wanted.
London
Campaigners from various groups, including Jews for Justice for Palestinians and International Anti-Zionist Network stood with the Stop the JNF banner at the London office of the Charity Commission.
Photo (right): Kenneth Dibble, Charity Commission Head of Legal Services, and Nick Allaby, Executive Director came out to receive the Stop the JNF application.
Taunton
They were expecting us! A very helpful security chap let us in and asked us if we were anything to do with the “petition” across the country. Neil Robertson came down from the Charity Commission office to receive our submission.
Photo (above): Neil Robertson of the Charity Commission, Taunton, receives the submission from Sharen Green from Stop the JNF watched by John Burbage
Photo (right): Jean Franklin from Wimborne and John Burbage from Sherborne at the Charity Commission, Taunton.
30 March 2013
