Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: The European lobby in Israel

The EU, realizing it cannot get Israel to change its laws through 
diplomatic means, has resorted to creating an internal lobby - through 
lavish funding of NGOs - to get Israel to bend.
Ever since the publication of John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt's The 
Israel Lobby there has been much talk of the "lobby." In England 
mainstream and respectable Channel 4 aired an entire program entitled 
Inside Britain's Israel Lobby which claimed the "lobby" "owns" the 
Conservative Party. Amidst all the talk of an Israel lobby in the West, 
people have ignored the growth of a lobby located in the Holy Land 
itself, the European lobby in Israel.
The European Parliament adopted the European Initiative for Democracy 
and Human Rights (EIDHR) in 1994. This was part of the European Union's 
broader belief that "democracy and human rights are universal values 
that should be vigorously promoted around the world." The initiative was 
supposed to promote democratization through the promotion of "fair and 
free" elections and mainstreaming "democratic values" through 
"accountability, transparency and equality."
In 2007, a subtle change in the name of the EIDHR was made. The word 
"initiative" was changed to "instrument." This seemingly banal change 
may be a result of semantic arguments among EU staffers but it puts in 
words the increasingly meddlesome way the EU has chosen to work within 
Israel.
The EU may have realized during the second intifada that its concerns 
were not being listened to. Perhaps they heeded the increasingly 
alarmist statements of Israelis themselves, such as former Haaretz 
editor David Landau who in 2007 told US secretary of state Condoleezza 
Rice that the US needed to "rape" Israel into a settlement with the 
Palestinians. Regardless of the exact cause, in 2002the European Union 
began lavishly funding non-governmental organizations in Israel . It 
claimed that it was doing this because of "the vital contribution made 
by NGOs to the promotion and protection of the principles of 
liberty,democracy, respect for human rights and the rule of law."
Between 2002 and 2008, a total of $14 million was granted to various 
Israeli NGOs through the EIDHR. My investigation of the NGOs that 
received funding revealed that the lion's share of the money benefited 
two groups: Palestinians and Israeli Arabs. $5.5 million was directed 
specifically to causes for Palestinians such as the Association for 
Civil Rightsin Israel 's project "Building a Better Future: Empowering 
the Palestinian Residents of East Jerusalem to access their planning and 
house [sic] rights" which received $135,000. A further $7m. went 
specifically to programs that benefit only Israeli Arabs such as the 
al-Awna fund's "Master Plan for the Unrecognized Beduin Villages: 
Securing minority rights for housing and social services" which received 
$263,000. Even when the EIDHR funded programs for women it did so only 
for programs for Beduin or Israeli Arab women, except for a token 
$100,000 it gave to an organization called Isha le Isha (Woman to Woman) 
which helps fight women trafficking.
There was not one cent directed specifically towards any of the numerous 
and diverse Jewish communities in Israel: Ethiopians, Russians, 
Yemenites, Persians or Jews from the Caucasus. The only mention of 
Jewish citizens as potential recipients was in a grant to the Mossawa 
Center, the advocacy center for Arab citizensin Israel . It received 
$402,000 for a project that "aims to combat racism and transform 
inter-communal relations between target groups who include the Jewish 
majority, Arab minority and ethnic groups including the Russian, 
Ethiopian, Mizrahi and Reform Jewish communities."
Around $73,000 was directed towards former IDF soldiers. It wasn't to 
help them with trauma or reward them for a "shared citizenship." It was 
to get them to "break the silence" about what they witnessed while in 
the army, to provide testimony that might lead to a process whereby 
European courts might put the soldiers or their officers on trial for 
war crimes. Of course that is not what Breaking the Silence stated for 
the public. They described their project as "personal encounters with 
former Israeli combat soldiers."
THE EIDHR's "instrument" to affect Israeli policy is merely the tip of 
the iceberg. In its November 2009 report "Trojan Horse: The impact of 
European government funding for Israeli NGOs" NGO Monitor illustrated 
that individual European embassies in Israel and other EU projects give 
lavishly to Israeli NGOs, sometimes even making up the majority of their 
budgets. In fact "foreign-funded local NGOs are responsible for a 
significant portion of the petitions brought before the Israeli High 
Court of Justice," says the report.
The EU, realizing it could not get Israel to change its laws through 
diplomatic means, has resorted to creating an internal lobby within 
Israel to get Israel to bend to the will of Europe.
Israel's human rights organizations would counter that it is not 
important where their money comes from, their cause is just. It is also 
true that some Israelihuman rights organizations view everything through 
the lens of the conflict, meaning they apply only for projects involving 
Palestinians or "Palestinian citizens of Israel" and don't have an 
interest in the rights of the Jewish population of the country.
Shatil, which claims to help Ethiopian Jews, applied for $1m. for Beduin 
and $1m. "to educate and raise awareness among the Arab residents of 
Israel's five Jewish/Arab mixed cities" and nothing for the Ethiopians.
The question is whether the EU funding of these organizations 
constitutes the creation of a shadow lobby. The EIDHR doesn't directly 
sue Israel on behalf of the freedom of movement of Palestinians. Instead 
it funds local NGOs that do. Furthermore the EIDHR sends $8.4m. in 
funding directly to NGOs in the Palestinian territories on top of the 
money it gives to Israeli NGOs whose projects only benefit Palestinians.
In every other country in the world, the EIDHR directs its funding 
towards large-scale projects supporting "democracy" and "civil society." 
In Egypt it gave $10m. (2003-2008), none of which went specifically 
towards projects for the minority Coptic Christians.
It is time for those, especially in Europe, who speak about a 
"Jewish/Israel" lobby to recognize that for eight years Europe has 
directed a concerted effort towards establishing a European lobby in 
Israel that discriminates against its Jewish population and supports 
some radical NGOs.
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=169478

 
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=169478
Putin quota convinto: Le ONG sono le quinte colonne del nemico, e
vanno combattute, insieme ai diritti umani che dicono di tutelare! La
russificazione di Israele è completa. Bravo, nipotino di Stalin, hai
fatto più tu in 10 anni che l'URSS in 40 per la causa dell'antisionismo