Jewish National Fund of Canada loses court appeal to regain charitable status

The Jewish National Fund of Canada (JNF) has lost an appeal to stop Canada’s tax department’s revocation of its charitable status, a stinging rebuke to the organisation that activists slam for funding Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian land. 

The Canadian revenue service in July revoked JNF’s status after a years-long audit revealing the organisation used donations to help fund infrastructure for the Israeli military, a foreign army, which contravenes Canada’s Tax Code.

Up to 25 percent of JNF Canada’s budget came from Canadian tax dollars. 

JNF was ordered to unwind its operations in Canada, but has been trying for months to repeal the decision, which also stipulated the organisation disperse its remaining assets, valued at roughly $31 million. 

Justice Allyson Whyte Nowak of the Federal Court of Canada rejected JNF’s appeal saying that it had taken its case to the wrong court. 

Whyte said her court was the wrong place for the charity to try to seek relief, because the Income Tax Act specifically designated the Federal Court of Appeal as the appropriate court. 

The decision is a win for pro-Palestinian activists who welcomed the revocation. 

“JNF has a long history of funding the illegal military occupation of Palestine and seizing Palestinian land while benefiting financially from tax breaks in Canada,” Palestinian human rights organisation Al-Haq said. 

Al-Haq noted that the fund contravenes Canadian charity regulations, which explicitly state that “supporting the armed forces of another country” does not qualify as charitable. 

Founded in 1901, almost forty years before the establishment of the state of Israel, the JNF is a private corporation that was created “with the purpose of purchasing land in what was then Ottoman-controlled Palestine” with the century-old slogan of “making the desert bloom”.

After the Six-Day War and the subsequent occupation of the rest of what is now occupied Palestine, the organisation shifted its claimed mission to “planting trees, building water reservoirs, preserving natural habitats, as well as building parks and bicycle trails”.

According to the Adalah legal centre, as of 2007, the JNF owned around 13 percent of present-day Israel and occupied Palestinian territories. JNF also claimed that over 70 percent of the Israeli population lived on land it owned. Its policies prevent the sale or lease of land to non-Jews, which is in contravention of international law. 

In 1991, a documentary highlighted an example of the JNF’s work in action, with an investigation on “Canada Park”. The park, which features the Canadian flag at its entrance, was built over the ruins of three destroyed Palestinian villages –  Beit Nuba, Imwas and, and Yalu – which displaced more than 9,000 Palestinians. 

Thousands of donations made in Canada and the US are tax-deductible, as JNF is categorised as a non-profit organisation. The main benefit to this classification is that it gives JNF the right to receive tax breaks and ensures donations are tax deductible.