The US and Israel have permitted tax-deductible donations to far-right organisations that have obstructed the delivery of aid to Gaza. An investigation by the Associated Press (AP) and the Israeli investigative site Shomrim has revealed that three groups obstructing humanitarian aid to Gaza, including one accused of looting or destroying supplies, have collectively raised over $200,000 from US and Israeli donors.
Allowing these donations to be tax-deductible contradicts the stated commitments of both the US and Israel to ensure unrestricted access to food, water and medicine in Gaza, says organisations striving to increase aid to the region. Moreover, contributions have persisted, despite US sanctions imposed on one of the groups in question.
According to Tania Hary, executive director of human rights group Gisha, Israel’s failure to take any action against these groups indicates a “lack of coherence” in its Gaza aid policy. “If you’re on the one hand saying you’re allowing aid in but then also facilitating the actions of groups that are blocking it, can you really say you’re facilitating aid?” she asked.
The AP and Shomrim investigation found that one group, Mother’s March, has raised over $125,000 through Givechack, an Israeli crowdfunding site, and around $13,000 via JGive, a US and Israeli crowdfunding site. Donations to these organisations are tax-deductible in both Israel and the US.
Mother’s March does not directly solicit these funds. Instead, it collaborates with an allied group called Torat Lechima, which raises money on its behalf and operates within Israeli nationalist circles, aiming to “strengthen the Jewish identity and fighting spirit” among Israeli soldiers, according to its website.
This group continues to raise funds for Mother’s March on the JGive site in the US. Moreover, until it was sanctioned last month, a third group, Tzav 9, had raised over $85,000 from nearly 1,500 donors in the US and Israel via JGive. The latter said that donations to Tzav 9 were frozen prior to the sanctions and not delivered to the group.
Members of Tzav 9 attacked and vandalised dozens of aid trucks travelling from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip earlier this year. In May, illegal settlers burned a Palestinian aid truck east of Ramallah and assaulted its driver. According to the Times of Israel, the Israeli far-right group has claimed responsibility for the attack and vowed to continue to block aid deliveries into the besieged Gaza Strip.
Israel, meanwhile, continues to ignore a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire, and faces international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza since the 7 October cross-border incursion by Hamas.
To date, the Israeli offensive has killed 38,794 Palestinians and wounded almost 90,000 others, with at least a further 10,000 missing, presumed dead, under the rubble of their homes. Moreover, around two million people in Gaza have been internally displaced, according to the UN.
Over nine months into the Israeli war, vast tracts of Gaza lie in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water and medicine.
Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whose latest ruling ordered it to immediately halt its military operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on 6 May.
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