Bill Aims to Cut Funding to Political Parties That Support Settlement Boycott

[Israeli]

Avigdor Lieberman submits bill after Hadash and Meretz expressed support for boycotting settlement products.

Jonathan Lis 17.10.2015

The Ministerial Committee for Legislation will decide on Sunday whether to direct the coalition to support a bill by Yisrael Beiteinu chairman Avigdor Lieberman that would withdraw funding from parties that support the boycott of Israeli or settlement products.
Lieberman’s bill is a response to a statement by Hadash and Meretz expressiing support for the boycott of settlement products and the justification expressed by MK Basel Ghattass (Joint List) for a boycott of Israel.

Parties that knowingly make a public call for boycotting Israel in a situation in which there is a reasonable chance the call will lead to a boycott, will not be eligible for funding, according to the bill.

“Parallel to the fight Israel is waging against boycotts, sanctions and other funding attacks by countries and international organizations and anti-Israel groups around the world interested in hurting Israel, it is fitting that the state itself does not fund parties in the Knesset calling on or supporting such a boycott,” reads the bill.
“These actions against ‘Israeli trade’ are a new form of the same old anti-Semitism that certainly has no place in the Knesset.”

Prof. Mordechai Kremnitzer and Dr. Amir Fuchs of the Israel Democracy Institute issued a sharp rebuttal of Lieberman’s bill to committee members.
“Funding parties is not a privilege that the government metes out,” they wrote. “A party’s survival depends on it. Without it, one of the elementary rights in a democracy – the right to elect and be elected – will be engangered.”
They argued that defunding a party on the basis of its position on the most controversial issue in Israeli politics, the future of the territories, is extremist and attacks the roots of the democratic process. “This is an attempt to limit freedom of political expression, which is the most protected right of expression, over the most controversial issue in Israeli political discourse,” they argued.

Source: http://www.haaretz.com/news/israel/.premium-1.680871

[DetlefK]

1. Oh, yeah. Because everybody who dislikes Israel's policies is automatically anti-semitic.

I wish I had saved the article:
A few months ago I read an article about an israeli think-tank who regularly writes a report on the state of Jews around the world. It gave a brief presentation of the report to the Knesset. How brief?
The think tank conducted a poll and found that Jews outside of Israel think Anti-Semitism and Anti-Israelism are two different things. For fear of reprisals from the israeli government and accusations of lacking patriotism, they buried the poll deep in their report and didn't mention it during the briefing.