Zionist organization Im Tirtzu released a new report documenting the German government’s funding of Zochrot, an Israeli NGO that works to “decolonize” Israel by promoting the “right of return” for Palestinian refugees.
According to its official website, Zochrot’s vision is to “promote acknowledgement and accountability for the ongoing injustices of the Nakba, the Palestinian catastrophe of 1948 and the reconceptualization of the Return as the imperative redress of the Nakba.”
The Israeli Corporations Authority’s non-profit registrar reported that from 2012-2016 the Government of Germany has provided over 1,100,000 NIS (290,000 USD) to Zochrot via two German foundations, Misereor and Rosa Luxemberg Stiftung, which are heavily funded by the federal German government.
This extensive funding was used by Zochrot to screen its “Film Festival on Nakba and the Right of Return” on college campuses during Israeli Apartheid Week, promote an “iNakba” smartphone application, and defame Israel on the world stage with slanderous language like “ethnic cleansing.”
In 2014, Zochrot CEO Eitan Bronstein and others among the organization’s officials produced a radical video calling the Holocaust “The best thing that ever happened” to the Jewish people.
It should be noted that in Israel, the Tel Aviv Cinematheque is the only Israeli theater that will show these Nakba movies and government funding for these movies from the Culture Ministry has been stopped.
Im Tirtzu sent a letter to Germany’s ambassador to Israel, Dr. Clemens Von Goetze, demanding the secession of German funding to Zochrot in response to report findings. The letter said: “What gives the Government of Germany the right to undermine the character of another democratic and sovereign nation? We are calling on your government to immediately cease all funding of ‘Zochrot.’ This funding makes a mockery of any and all efforts to find a peaceful solution to any Israeli-Palestinian issues.”
The truth is it also makes a mockery of Germany’s efforts to somehow compensate and come clean from the Holocaust.
The German Embassy has not yet responded to Im Tirtzu’s letter. Perhaps the Israeli Government itself should step in and enforce its own laws. that prohibit foreign governments funding NGO's.
Im Tirtzu CEO Matan Peleg said: “The idea that Germany in 2017 is funding an organization that brazenly seeks to destroy the Jewish character of the State of Israel is a disgrace. This funding is not only dishonors the memory of the 6 million Jews who perished in the Holocaust, but is anti-democratic at its core. This is another painful example of foreign governments working to impose their unwanted policies on the State of Israel via anti-Israel NGOs from within.”
