Israeli bill targeting leftwing NGOs passes first hurdle

An Israeli bill targeting groups that campaign largely on Palestinian human rights issues has overcome its first hurdle in the process to become law.

The proposed legislation, which would compel NGOs receiving most of their funding from foreign governments to declare it in official reports, passed its first reading in the Israeli parliament by 50 votes to 43 on Tuesday.

The legislation has been criticised as it would only affect leftwing Israeli organisations, many of which are funded by EU countries, and not rightwing NGOs, which are supported by private donations from wealthy supporters of Israel. MPs who oppose the legislation described it as “political persecution” and an erosion of Israeli democracy.

The opposition leader, Isaac Herzog, said the law would damage Israel’s standing among its friends abroad. Last month, the US ambassador to Israel, Dan Shapiro, said: “Governments must protect free expression and peaceful dissent and create an atmosphere where all voices can be heard.”

The bill is being promoted by the rightwing justice minister, Ayelet Shaked, who says it will boost transparency as the government seeks to fight foreign interference and attempts to delegitimise the state of Israel.

Speaking in a parliamentary debate before the first of three votes on the bill, Shaked made clear the politically sectarian nature of the legislation. “After years in which the leftwing exploited the issue of transparency and used it as an administrative and political tool against the rightwing, you began to think that transparency was your inheritance and began to treat it like your own property. As if transparency were a property that was registered in your father’s name,” she said.

Shaked’s bill, which has the support of the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, is seen by critics as a key front in Israel’s escalating culture wars, which have pitted the rightwing government against NGOs, Israeli artists, and foreign mediaand governments.