Thursday, July 24, 2008
JTA has done a follow-up on their extensive investigative report on the anti-Israel NGO's funded by the multi-billion dollar Ford Foundation: Durban's Descendants. The good news is that the situation is much better. The bad news is that funding to problematic groups like Miftah and Al Haq...and the New Israel Fund (see JTA report on NIF here) continues.
...The new JTA investigation, which examined a large cross-section of Ford grantees that speak out on the Middle East conflict, finds that several signed a major 2005 boycott and divestment petition against "Apartheid Israel.”
Signatories agreed they were “inspired by the struggle of South Africans against apartheid, and in the spirit of international solidarity, moral consistency and resistance to injustice and oppression.”
As Ford was announcing its decision not to support the 2009 anti-racism forum, its Web site touted a 2008-09 grant for $305,000 to the Arab NGO Network for Development, which features a map on its Web site that fails to note the existence of Israel. One of the two Palestinian members on its coordination committee is the pro-boycott Palestinian NGO Network, or PNGO, a key organizer at Durban.
Although PNGO is no longer receiving grants from Ford, which has assets above $13 billion and gives away more than $500 million annually, the network works closely with at least three Ford grantee organizations...
