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JNF’s loss of charitable status justified by its conduct

Hill Times - Sept. 4, 2024 / Washington Report on Middle East Affairs - October 2024

The Jewish National Fund (JNF) has operated in Canada for over 100 years, accepting charitable donations from Canadians who support the State of Israel, its goals and actions.

While the JNF does raise funds to plant trees and build infrastructure (military and civilian) in Israel, its main objective is buying so-called state land in Israel proper and restricting its sale and use to Israeli Jews.

Much of the JNF-owned land had previously been seized from Palestinian farmers under obscure Ottoman-era laws allowing the state to declare fallow fields to be abandoned by their owners. This policy impoverished many Israel Palestinians whose situation was arguably better than that of West Bank residents under Israeli martial law or Gazans under total blockade.

Many of the over 500 Palestinian towns and villages destroyed in 1948, 1967 and later are covered by trees and vegetation of European origin, possibly to obscure the former cultivation of olives, citrus fruit and other plants by Palestinian farmers driven off by European Zionists.

Stephen Harper proudly gave his blessing to Canada Park, an Israeli pine forest planted over a bulldozed Palestinian village.

It is not so-called anti-Jewish racism that caused the JNF’s loss of charitable status, but its active role in supporting questionable and often illegal Israeli territorial seizures. The endless overuse of anti-semitic accusations against critics of Israeli conduct is discrediting this tactic and revealing its deeper role as a device of censorship.

Morgan Duchesney: Ottawa - Canada