Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: THE NGO CAMPAIGN AGAINST  ISRAEL DEMOCRACY

THE NGO CAMPAIGN AGAINST  ISRAEL DEMOCRACY
 
 
 
Gerald M. Steinberg
 
 
By any objective standard, Israeli democracy is as robust and
pluralistic as any in the world. There are no restrictions on any form
of protest or advocacy, including very fierce and unpopular criticism
of the government and military. No other democracy can claim to have
greater freedom of expression, despite more than six decades of war
and terrorism; threats of annihilation; and in parallel, the
challenges of developing a cohesive society based on numerous
divergent communities scattered for generations as Diasporas, many of
which do not have traditions of pluralism and democracy.
 
 
 
Of course, our society is not perfect -- like other nations, we have
flaws, and it is our responsibility to correct them. But aggressive
campaigns greatly exaggerate these imperfections, as part of the
ongoing effort to delegitimize Israel, led by the soft-power of and
well-financed "civil society" groups, which themselves are not subject
to any democratic accountability. These accusations should not be
accepted at face value, and must be tested against credible evidence
that is independently verifiable.
 
 
 
Israel's democratic credentials include a wide-open electoral process:
a free and highly critical press; a vibrant NGO sector with tens of
thousands of political and social groups across the political
spectrum, engaging in intense debate; as well as the systematic
protection of the rights of minorities to freedom of expression and
protest.
 
 
 
For example, each year, Israeli police forces and government
institutions facilitate Gay Pride parades in Jerusalem Tel Aviv,
Haifa, and Eilat; marches on Human Rights Day; protests by the Islamic
movement; and to observances of the murder of Yitzhak Rabin. In the
summer of 2011, mass demonstrations on socio-economic issues were a
testament to Israel's dynamic civil society and a culture of advocacy
and peaceable protest. Israeli police facilitated these activities,
blocking off roads and granting permits. The government responded to
protestors' demands positively, in the form of a task force to address
their claims.
 
 
 
In Egypt, Tunisia, Syria and elsewhere, where thousands were murdered
at the hands of their own governments, pro-democracy activists were
quoted as taking inspiration from the democratic nature of Israel and
its commitment to freedom of expression.
 
 
 
Similarly, while Arab representatives in the Knesset frequently deny
the legitimacy and advocate the destruction of Israel, for which they
are strongly criticized in democratic political debate, their right to
express these views has not been infringed. MK Haneen Zoabi was aboard
the Mavi Marmara, a boat operated by the Turkish group IHH (a member
of the Union of Good, a U.S.-banned terror organization), from which
Israeli soldiers were brutally attacked. In some other democracies,
participation in an armed attack against one's own military forces
would be considered treason, but no criminal charges were made against
Zoabi. Instead, she received a minor rebuke, and continues to freely
travel around the world denouncing the State of Israel, ironically in
whose parliament she sits.
 
 
 
However, all of this has been erased by the promoters of an intense
and well-financed campaign falsely accusing Israel of "anti-democratic
behavior," arising from growing criticism and debate over the massive
and unprecedented level of non-transparent European government funding
for highly political non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
 
 
 
The powerful NGOs that receive this illicit largesse, removed from any
democratic checks and balances, have launched a concerted effort to
silence this debate. But partisan allegations from NGOs should not be
taken at face value; in a democracy, groups claiming to speak in the
name of human rights have no immunity from criticism and public
debate.
 
 
 
Leaders of powerful NGOs should face the same type of scrutiny as
other political actors, including elected officials. The importance of
this process was illustrated in a "wikileaks" cable in which a New
Israel Fund (NIF) official, Hedna Radanovitz, told a U.S. diplomat
that"the disappearance of a Jewish state would not be [a] tragedy,"
revealing a contrast between NIF's public statements in support of
Zionism.
 
 
 
Thus, criticism and analysis of NGOs is not anti-democratic - indeed,
it is the essence of the democratic process. And the debate over the
secret NGO funding processes, and of their false claims of "war
crimes", as repeated in the discredited Goldstone report, does not
prevent Israeli NGOs such as Breaking the Silence, Yesh Din,
Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), Public Committee
Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), and many others from publicizing
their allegations.
 
 
 
Statements by foreign leaders, such as Hillary Clinton, and media
reports on these issues, both in Israel and outside, have repeated the
NGO slogans and distortions. Allegations in the editorial pages of the
New York Times also fail to address basic issues related to the unique
context of NGO political power in Israel, the secret foreign
government funding processes, and the fact that the proposed Knesset
legislation has been rejected by the robust Israeli democratic
process.
 
 
 
More broadly, those who blindly repeat and echo false claims of an
"anti-democratic" wave in Israel are again applying double standards
and using false claims in order to isolate and condemn the Jewish
nation state, as part of the ongoing ideological and cynical campaign
of delegitimization. The exploitation of the language of democracy as
a weapon to promote campaigns by narrow opposition groups empowered
through secret funding processes, and not subject to any checks and
balances, is the real threat to Israeli democracy.

 THE NGO CAMPAIGN AGAINST  ISRAEL DEMOCRACY
 
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