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CONTACT: Naomi Paiss
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Statement of the New Israel Fund: Baloney. Distortions. Simply Not True.

28 May 2010

Yet again, the NGO Monitor distorts the facts in a misleading attempt to associate the New Israel Fund with the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement.

Our position is clear. We disagree with BDS as a strategy used against Israel to end the occupation. We think it is inflammatory and creates more heat than light. We do not fund any BDS activities against Israel nor fund any organization for which it is a substantial part of their activities, nor will we.

Organizations with strong track records on behalf of civil and human rights in Israel will not be excluded for signing one letter. An organization that provides a list of companies profiting from their business dealings in the occupied territories is illuminating the economic effects of the occupation, and is within our guidelines If any organization becomes substantially involved in BDS activities, we will conduct ourselves as all responsible funders do and handle the matter directly with the grantee and without credence to the shrill voices of professional demagogues.

If and when NGO Monitor wants to expose those organizations that are truly delegitimizing Israel, we suggest they begin investigating the extremist settler organizations undermining the rule of law, minority rights, the peace process and the U.S.-Israel relationship. When NGOM impartially investigates the right-wing groups whose activities truly diminish Israel’s standing as a liberal democracy, perhaps they will deserve their “monitoring” designation. Until then, their anti-democratic attempts to stifle the voices of those who, in this difficult climate, dare to publicly disagree with Israeli government policy, will not affect the policies, priorities or values of the New Israel Fund family.

NGO Monitor’s latest attack on NIF is baloney. It grossly distorts the facts. And, in its attempt to associate NIF with a strategy we clearly reject, it is simply not true.

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