11 Israeli civil society organizations (CSOs) Sunday issued a joint call to donors of designated Palestinian NGOs to maintain and even increase their funding, according to a statement.
In a joint statement published in Haaretz on 5 November 2021, “we called on the international community to unequivocally oppose the Israeli government’s designation of six Palestinian civil society organizations as ‘terrorist organizations’. As our statement says: criminalizing the work of these prominent Palestinian NGOs is an act of cowardice, characteristic of repressive authoritarian regimes.”
“The designations are intended to intimidate international donors of the six NGOs and of Palestinian civil society more broadly. For years, the Israeli government and groups affiliated with it have been waging aggressive campaigns to defund NGOs that peacefully challenge Israel’s occupation and annexation policies. Palestinian NGOs have been the main target of these campaigns. The recent designations are the Israeli government’s ultimate attempt to defund them.”
“We urge all donors of the six NGOs – governments, foundations and individuals – to maintain and, if possible, to increase their funding. Defunding the designated NGOs based on unsubstantiated allegations and designations will cause irreparable damage to Palestinian civil society at large and would undermine decades of humanitarian and human rights work,” the statement concluded.
The signatories of the statement are the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, Breaking the Silence, B’Tselem, Combatants for Peace, Center for the Defence of the Individual (Hamoked), Human Rights Defenders Fund, Ir Amim, the Israeli Center for Public Affairs (Ofek), Parents Against Child Detention, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) and Yesh Din.
