Charity That Backed Anti-Israel Events Loses Government Cash

A British charity that sponsored events accused of promoting hatred and violence against Jews and Israel has lost its government funding.

The Department for International Development (Dfid) said that it no longer supported War on Want, which helped underwrite “Israeli Apartheid Week” in February.

According to a report in the Daily Telegraph, it had obtained secret recordings of events, backed by War on Want, where anti-Semitic comments and demands for the destruction of Israel were expressed.

One speaker, Max Blumenthal, the son of a close adviser to Bill and Hillary Clinton, praised a massacre by Hamas as sending an “incredible message” and said that taking up arms should be “normal” for Palestinians. He compared Israel to the terrorist group Islamic State, describing it as “the Jewish State of Israel and the Levant, Jsil”.

At another rally – sponsored by War on Want – a speaker said that British government policy was created by “Zionist and neo-con lobbies”.

A Dfid spokesman told the newspaper that it has ceased funding of the charity, said to amount to £260,000 in the past year, apart from a small project in Northern Ireland.

An article posted on War on Want’s website on February 1, said the charity was “proud to be co-sponsoring some great events for IAW 2016”.

It listed one of the events as a panel discussion at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London on February 22.

As Breitbart London reported, the London Underground was used by the charity for a poster campaign marking  Israeli Apartheid Week earlier this year.

The self-described “wave of truth” alleged British-made arms were used to “massacre” Palestinians during Israel’s last operation against Hamas. An estimated 500 posters appeared on the transport network over the course of one Sunday night under the banner ‘Apartheid is Great Britain’.

Images circulated on social media revealed it was part of a four-poster campaign operating without official sanction from London Underground or Transport for London.

Some posters suggested the BBC’s reporting is biased towards Israel, while another targeted security company G4S which operates some prisons in Israel and the West Bank.

At the time images on social media suggested the adverts were driven by Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement (BDS) activists who took to Twitter to call for support for their campaign using the hashtag #IsraeliApartheidWeek

NGO Monitor lists other donors to War on Want that include: European Union, Ireland, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation (Germany), the Lipman-Miliband Trust and Interpal.

Follow Simon Kent on Twitter:  Follow @SunSimonKent or e-mail to: skent@breitbart.com