American Based New Israel Fund Trying to Topple Netanyahu

Yesterday, a recently formed organization called Zazim began a campaign to topple Prime Minister Netanyahu.  Currently, the Prime Minister is under investigation in two separate cases dealing with gifts that received from a businessman and certain ties and deals he may have had with the Media.

Avichai Mandelblit, the attorney general and a Netanyahu appointee, will be the one who will decide whether to recommend an indictment for Netanyahu. The organization is trying to apply public pressure on Avichai Mandelblit to recuse himself from the current investigation against Netanyahu. Zazim has begun their campaign by hanging up signs near Mandelblit’s house which say: “Mandelblit – Netanyahu’s Bodyguard” and call for him to recuse himself from all aspects of the investigation.

While Zazim  tries to appear as a populist movement, in reality it is another arm of the of New Israel Fund (NIF) which is an American based 501(c)3 organization which has been actively trying to undermine Israel’s character as a Jewish state. In 2015, Zazim received a $175,000 grant from NIF, part directly from NIF and the remainder funded by private donors in coordination with NIF.

Zazim presents itself as a “campaigning community for social and political change”, who are united by, “shared values of human rights, social justice, combating racism and the occupation, environmental protection, government transparency and independent media.” In an interview on army radio, Zazim’s executive director, Raluca Ganea, admitted that the organization is “political but not partisan”.

The organization may be not affiliated with a certain party, yet the leaders of Zazim and its chief activists are all connected with other radical left wing organizations – also funded by NIF. In the year 2015, the following radical left wing organizations all received grants from NIF: The Association for Civil Rights in Israel ($485,000), Yesh Din ($77,000), Adva Center ($207,000), Mahapach ($77,000).

Ganea, executive director and co-founder, has been an activist in the radical organization Avaaz which has run pro-Palestinian campaigns which called for a boycott of Israel in the wake of Operation Protective Edge in 2015, and took part in the Coalition of Women conference. The Coalition of Women, funded by NIF in the past, is a major organization behind the BDS campaign.  Ganea has also published articles where she places sole blame on Israel for the Palestinian-Israel conflict, and has defended reporters who publicized classified information leaked to them by IDF soldiers.

The other co-founder of Zazim, Libby Lenkiski, took an active role in smearing Israel at the UN Human Rights Council through the ‘Shadow Report’ which accuses Israel of human rights violations against Palestinians, Bedouins and Israel-Arabs.

Ziv Stahl, Chair of the Board of Directors for Zazim, was previously head of the research department at Yesh Din. This organization recently handed over classified information on Israel to the United Nations. Stahl is an  activist for a Palestinian state,  and publicized a report accusing Israel of failing to enforce the law against right wing activists and is therefore responsible for injury of innocent Palestinians.

And the list continues.

Shada Zoabi, is a campaigner for Zazim, served as spokeswoman for The Association for Civil Rights in Israel. Previously, she was a legislative staffer for former Arab MK Azmi Bashara, who fled Israel after being charged with espionage for the terrorist organization Hezbollah during the second Lebanese war in 2006, and MK Haneen Zoabi, who took part in the violent Gaza flotilla, where IDF soldiers were attacked with knives and pipes, and has also used every public forum possible to attack Israel, support BDS and convicted Palestinian prisoners.

Nirit Moskovich, a member of Zazim’s board of directors,  previous served as spokesperson for the Association for Civil Right in Israel and is also a supporter of ‘Breaking the Silence’, an organization that has smeared IDF soldiers worldwide. She verbally attacked previous Homeland Security Minister Itzhak Aharonovich for supporting a border policeman who shot a terrorist trying to stab him, has pressured the UN to investigate IDF war crimes after Operation Cast Lead in 2007 and has appealed  repeatedly to Israel’s Supreme Court against all efforts made by the government to curb illegal immigration.

The members listed here, who are the leaders of Zazim, portray themselves as leading a populist campaign against the democratically elected government of Israel. However, this is but another effort in the continued witch hunt led by a small group of radicals to remove Prime Minister Netanyahu. They hope to have AG Mandelblit recuse himself from the investigation, and in his place have someone who they will believe will indict the Prime Minister.

As mentioned, NIF is not an Israeli organization, rather it is an American non-profit organization funded through tax deductible donations by American citizens. NIF’s efforts to intervene in an ongoing government investigation in Israel, pressure a senior legal figure, and topple a democratically elected Prime Minister, clearly crosses a red line and calls into question the legitimacy of its actions.

Gideon Israel contributed to this article