Methinks the left doth protest too much Ruthie Blum
https://www.jns.org/methinks-the-left-doth-protest-too-much/
In a letter obtained last week by Israel Insider, Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Brian Mast (R-Fla.)—the chairs of the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary and Foreign Affairs committees, respectively—requested of the Jewish Communal Fund, Middle East Dialogue Network, Movement for Quality Government in Israel, PEF Israel Endowment Funds, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, and Blue and White Future that they “produce all documents and information” about dubious practices vis-à-vis Israel.
The March 26 missive to the heads of the above organizations got right to the point in the first paragraph.
“According to reports, the Biden-Harris administration funneled U.S. taxpayer money to certain Israeli entities with the effect of attempting to undermine Israel’s democratically elected government,” it began, with a footnote referencing two JNS articles—one by Caroline Glick and the other by David Isaac.
As Glick noted, “Since MQG’s primary activity is subverting democracy in Israel by waging lawfare and sowing chaos in a bid to block democratically elected right-wing governments from fulfilling their pledges to voters, it’s fairly clear that when MQG refers to ‘democracy education,’ it doesn’t mean majority rule.”
Isaac’s piece, which appeared on Feb. 18 this year, showed how Elon Musk’s efforts to “expose waste and misuse of funds” by “America’s administrative state” led to the emergence of reports that the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) had been heavily funding the anti-government judicial-reform protests in Israel.
The letter by Jordan and Mast went on to stress that the “use of federal grants in this manner not only jeopardizes America’s relationship with one of its closest allies, but also undermines core civil liberties protected within the United States and Israel. Additionally, the misuse of federal grant funds may, in some cases, amount to a criminal offense.”
Jordan and Mast then clarified the impetus for their probe.
“In 2023, Israel experienced widespread protests over the government’s plan to reform the country’s judicial system,” they wrote. “The Biden-Harris administration openly opposed the proposed reforms, with President Biden saying that Israel ‘cannot continue down this road.’ Media reports later revealed that these protests were funded in part by U.S. grant money that had been funneled through various American and Israeli NGOs to groups directing the protests.”
They proceeded to specify that, “according to public media reports, in 2023, Blue and White Future, ‘an Israeli NGO that funded and ran the headquarters for the coalition of groups opposing judicial reform,’ received approximately $4 million from a U.S.-based NGO, Middle East Peace Dialogue Network (MEPDN) through the Jewish Communal Fund and Rockefeller Philanthropy Adivsors.”
This, said Jordan and Mast, “was not the first time U.S. taxpayer-funded grants had been used to support protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or the policies he supports.”
Unfortunately, they added, “these reports reflect the poor track record of USAID and the State Department in funding entities in the region. USAID and the State Department have even provided direct support to Hamas and other terrorist groups. From 2007 through 2024, USAID and the State Department sent at least $122 million to NGOs aligned with designated terrorist organizations. Many of those NGOs have openly espoused antisemitic rhetoric and encouraged violence against Jewish individuals.”
The letter concluded with a detailed list of the data demanded by Congress, which “has an important interest in ensuring that taxpayer-funded grants are used in a manner that is consistent with statutory authorization and congressional intent.”
An investigation into the money trail from Team Biden to the Israeli machine still operating to topple Netanyahu should cause the movement’s radical engineers to shake in their Birkenstocks. After all, full-page ads in newspapers cost a fortune.
Ditto for highway banners, tents, flags and loudspeaker systems. And let’s not forget the hundreds of Handmaid’s Tale costumes signifying the plight that awaits Israeli women in the event that a modicum of balance is restored to the branches of government.
Having the flow of dollars severed would put a real damper on their ongoing campaign, which has come to include enveloping many of the hostage families with a dangerous bear hug. To make matters worse for the devious NGOs in question, Channel 14‘s Tamir Morag reported on Monday that MQG chairman Eliad Shraga and Blue and White Future CEO Eran Schwartz are expected to be summoned by Congress for questioning.
Schwartz promptly rejected claims that he and his “anybody but Bibi” buddies were abetted in their endeavors by the Biden administration. He’s probably counting on the difficulty that the likes of Jordan and Mast will have in drawing a direct link between the coffers of one “charity” with a political agenda to another.
This is likely the same reason that then-State Department Principal Deputy Spokesperson Vedant Patel was confident in his own denial about his office’s funding of the Israeli protest movement. In a press briefing on March 27, 2023, he expressed righteous indignation at the very suggestion.
“Any notion that we are propping up or supporting these protests or the initiators of them is completely and demonstrably false,” he said. “The Movement of Quality Government … received a modest grant from the State Department that was initiated during the previous administration, and the latest disbursal of funds came in September of 2022, prior to the most recent Israeli elections. And this grant supported an educational program for Jerusalem schools that supplemented their civic-studies curriculum.”
The timeline is laughable. MQG is but one leftist NGO that’s been staging anti-Netanyahu demonstrations for years. And Shraga appears so often before Israel’s High Court of Justice to represent petitioners against all things Bibi-related that he’s reached the celebrity status of a reality-TV star.
It remains to be seen whether Jordan and Mast will succeed at extinguishing this particular aspect of USAID’s wasteful, often pernicious, activities. But it’s a relief to have the powers-that-be in Washington put a stop to the gaslighting.
Indeed, to borrow from Queen Gertrude in Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” the left “doth protest too much, methinks.” Literally and figuratively.
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