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FEBRUARY 18, 2021 | The Jewish Home
ing told the AFP. “We never thought turmeric would be such a big issue. We had taken it for granted. Now, we can’t afford to use it in our daily cooking.”
JNF-KKL to Expand Jewish Settlement in Judea and Samaria
In the first, the Jewish National Fund (JNF-KKL) will dedicate its considerable resources to expanding
Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria. The move, which was approved on Sunday by the executive committee, will see the Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael Jewish National Fund (KKL-JNF) earmark funds for purchasing Palestinian land in Judea and Samaria. The century-old charity will dedicate hundreds of millions to the effort, which will see the organization ramp up its efforts to locate and purchase available Arab-owned properties. Executive Committee members approved the initiative by a slim margin of 6-5, which came after they were given a legal briefing outlining how such land purchases do not violate international law. The plan still needs to be approved by the Board of Directors when it meets in March for it to become official policy. As per the resolution, the JNFKKL will develop Jewish communities by funding “projects, education, forestation and environmental protection.” The JNF-KKL will not work to build new settlements and will restrict its activities to expanding existing Jewish villages. Land purchases will focus primarily on properties aligning towns that seek to build out, such as Neve Danial, Efrat, and Ariel.
In addition, the JNF will buy property located in areas A and B, which comprise 40% of Judea and Samaria and are administered by the Palestinian Authority. The move represents a significant policy shift for KKL-JNF, which has worked to further Jewish settlement in Israel since its founding in 1901. While the organization has historically purchased land in both Judea and Samaria and in pre-1967 borders, it has never adopted expanding the settlements as official policy. With billions of funds at JNFKKL’s disposal, the policy shift would accelerate the effort to further Israel’s presence over the Green Line. Apart from the financial benefits, JNF-KKL would aid the settlement project by putting the organization’s enormous legal apparatus at its disposal. The move was sharply condemned by left-wing movements, politicians, and liberal denominations in both the Israel and the U.S. as something that would make it more difficult to establish a Palestinian State. Prior to the vote, Defense Minister Benny Gantz asked the Executive Committee to delay the “highly sensitive” vote due to the effect it would have “in the international arena as well as in relations with the incoming U.S. administration and relations with Diaspora Jewry.” In a statement, the Union for Reform Judaism called the policy shift “anti-Zionist,” contending that “politicizing support for cherished Zionist institutions ill serves the cause of Zionism and the unity of the Jewish people.” On the other side of the spectrum, the charedi Eretz Hakodesh faction, which was integral to the vote to allow the purchases, said that it is “excited to be part of an historic decision.” “Our goal was to highlight the fact that Diaspora Jewry supports The State of Israel and wants to strengthen the settlement movement and assist in maintaining its security. I am proud of this amazing achievement and congratulate our partners for it,” said Eretz Hakodesh head Rabbi Pesach Lerner. Rabbi Lerner said that groups like Reform and others that are criticizing the vote should “respect the majority decision” and “refrain from cooperating with foreign parties in order to create a false representation of crisis and diplomatic pressure.” The Eretz Hakodesh faction, a charedi American faction that ran for the first time in the last World Zionist Organization (WZO) elections,
winning an impressive 20,000 votes, became the third largest faction in the WZO in the United States. It was the establishment of this right-wing coalition that enabled the representatives of the right-wing factions to take over key positions and pass resolutions to strengthen Jewish settlement throughout the Land of Israel for the first time in the history of the World Zionist Organization (WZO). Rabbi Lerner noted the achievement of the inclusion of the charedi communities of Emanuel and Beitar Illit together with the charedi city of Kiryat Sefer in the decision which was made. This is after the wording of the published initial decision attached a list of communities defined as “preferential areas for purchase.” But the charedi communities were not included in that list. Upon receiving the wording of the decision, the faction’s representatives worked tirelessly to include the charedi communities of Beitar Illit and Emanuel in the list of preferential communities.
Encouraging Data on Pfizer Vaccine
New data from Israel’s Maccabi health care provider showed that not a single person tested died after receiving Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine. As Israel’s largest health insurers, Maccabi had been asked by the Health Ministry to track the effects of the vaccination campaign amongst its customers. According to Maccabi, 544 people out of 523,000 tested positive after receiving both doses of the Pfizer vaccine, or 0.1% in total. Out of the 544 people who subsequently contracted COVID-19, the vast majority reported no symptoms. In total, 15 patients required hospitalization, with four in critical condition. After comparing the results with a control group of unvaccinated Israelis, Maccabi put the vaccine’s efficacy rate at 93%, in line with similar studies and within the margin of error of the 95% reported by Pfizer. Maccabi executives hailed the results, saying
