May 3, 2021
This newsletter advertises Ilan Pappe’s webinar, the last one in this series, in which we will hear about the role of the JNF in the Nakba – the first wave of the ongoing catastrophe for Palestinians in 1948. This is a topic of critical importance, especially given the ever-strengthening acceptance of the fact that Israel is guilty of the crimes of Apartheid and Persecution: the Nakba was a seminal event in the construction of Israeli Apartheid, and the JNF played (and still plays) a crucial role in this crime against humanity.
Also included: links to the Human Rights Watch Report on Israel’s crimes of Apartheid and Persecution, an update on the Sumarin family of East Jerusalem, a piece on JNF UK’s support for pre-military academies and how to catch up on past webinars. See the newsletter here: May Newsletter 2
Apr 29, 2021
Earlier this year (2021) we reported that Israel’s Supreme Court backed down from evicting the Sumarin family and passed the decision to the representative of the state, the Attorney General. This is a move which clearly indicates where the responsibility lies for demolition of Palestinian homes throughout the Occupied Territories: with the Israeli apartheid regime itself and its willing agents, JNF and Elad.
All Members of the UK Parliament were informed about the Supreme Court case in advance and were asked to make fresh representations to Dominic Raab, Foreign Secretary. Sheffield MPs responded collectively here. The link which opens up gives you access to the letter and also takes you to an earlier message sent by the same group to Dominic Raab.
We welcome the move and urge all MPs to speak up for the family and against the mass expulsions in East Jerusalem: please ask your MP to speak up.
Apr 28, 2021
On Tuesday 27th April, the New York based Human Rights Watch declared that Israel’s rule over the Palestinians constitutes the crime of apartheid, a crime of the highest order. The criminality applies both at the collective level (to the state of Israel) and to named individuals within that state for their role in the crime.
Significantly, the report acknowledges the Jewish National Fund’s (JNF) central role in Israel’s system of apartheid.
The report notes how “semi-governmental bodies like the JNF, Jewish Agency, and WZO that serve the Jewish community and no other constituency” ensure Palestinians are excluded from land in Israel.
Moreover, the report analyses the JNF’s contemporary role in advancing the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem.
The JNF is a racist organisation, which is complicit in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, both during the Nakba of 1948, and with the land seizures and house demolitions that have continued relentlessly.
The JNF established the British Park on three destroyed and ethnically cleansed Palestinian villages. It is active in the destruction of Palestinians villages like Umm al Hiran, replaced by an exclusively Jewish village, and Al Araqib, destroyed 185 times to make way for a JNF ‘forest’.
Despite this, the JNF’s UK branch is a registered charity.
Defining Israel as a state practising apartheid brings responsibilities for the international community to end their complicity. This includes the removal of the JNF UK’s charitable status.
Find out more about the role of the JNF by coming to the meeting with Illan Pappe on Saturday 8th May.
Apr 16, 2021
The Irresistible Rise of the Apartheid Analysis of Israel.
This Newsletter previews the Webinar featuring Richard Falk, co-author with Virginia Tilley of a definitive report which proved Israel’s apartheid status. It also covers the significant issue of the B’Tselem Report, which reached the same conclusion as Falk and Tilley, proclaiming Israel to be an apartheid regime, from the river to the sea. The addition of the voice of this influential Jewish Israeli Human Rights organisation to the clamour to tell the truth about Israel, is a very significant step. As if to prove the point, The JNF/KKL announced its decision to fund further land confiscation in the West Bank – all of which would support yet more illegal Israeli colonies.
Read the newsletter here
Apr 16, 2021
Read the full newsletter here March 2021 (2)
Apr 16, 2021
Climate change and its impacts are being manipulated as yet another Israeli tool for the eviction and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. However, global environmental activists, who rightly defends indigenous peoples’ struggles elsewhere, are too often silent when it comes to the connections between climate change and the Palestinian struggle against Israeli colonisation. An obvious example of this is how the Jewish National Fund (JNF), one of the core drivers of the [settler] colonization of Palestine is not being challenged by the climate justice movement around the world.
Registered as an environmental charity, the JNF was established to ethnically cleanse Palestinians. Currently, the JNF is active in the de facto and de jure annexation of Occupied West Bank, which is deemed illegal under International Law.
In this session, the Palestine Cop26 Coalition and Stop the JNF Campaign, UK expose the JNF’s greenwash and shed light on the urgency of supporting Palestinian grassroots struggle as part of the decolonization of climate emergency: Challenging the JNF in multiple countries and keeping it out of any climate emergency response like the COP26. Jamal Juma, the coordinator of Stop the Wall and long-standing Palestinian activists as well as other international anticolonial environmentalists will be speaking in the session. The session will also include film footage of popular struggles against JNF’s colonization within and outside Palestine.
Registration information here
