Netanyahu spearheads populist 'madness'

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to task Tourism Minister Yariv Levin with formulating a stricter new version of the "NGO law" simply shows how serious he is about it. Levin is more than just Netanyahu's loyal cohort in the Likud Party and his personal envoy for all sorts of special operations. He has been working hard to ensure the rapid advance of this proposed law, which would completely ban Israeli nongovernmental organizations from receiving donations from foreign governments. Levin is already well-known for his struggle to reduce the power of the Supreme Court, which he sees as a branch of the Israeli left. He is, therefore, the ideal candidate to implement Netanyahu's most recent instructions.

Netanyahu made the announcement June 11, at a meeting of coalition party leaders. He explained that the existing law, which obligates NGOs to reveal their sources of foreign funding, is still too weak, since it only resolves the problem of transparency. Now the prime minister wants to block the flow of money from overseas to those NGOs that he believes are operating against the Israel Defense Forces.

Netanyahu said that Levin was instructed to propose new legislation, which would include a comprehensive ban on receiving donations from foreign governments. Such a law is expected to cause considerable harm to many NGOs with no political affiliation, but which advance civil rights or support social and educational activities. It could also damage Israel's international image as a democratic state. Nevertheless, not one of the coalition party leaders protested this new initiative. Even the next day, when Netanyahu used the Likud faction's weekly meeting to make the celebratory announcement that he had appointed Levin to oversee this new initiative, there was no one to raise a red flag in opposition to Netanyahu.

It is believed that Levin will soon submit a draft of the proposed legislation for the Cabinet to review, before the bill goes to the Knesset Legislation Committee for approval and for the Knesset plenum to adopt. Meanwhile, the Likud is planning to begin the actual legislative process before the Knesset goes on its summer recess in late July.