The Jewish National Fund of America said Thursday that it expects a temporary injunction restricting its use of a map of Israel in fund-raising activities to be lifted when it submits a new map for court approval “in a week or 10 days.”
According to Stuart Paskow, JNF’s director of communications, that will clear the land reclamation and afforestation agency of all charges brought against it by the Ad Hoc Committee for Jewish Survival in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, Gaza and the Golan.
Paskow told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that New York state Supreme Court Judge Shirley Fingerhood has dismissed four of the six charges brought against JNF by the ad hoc committee, which supports the concept of a “Greater Israel.”
The charges dismissed had to do with fraud and misrepresentation, Paskow said.
But on Feb. 21, Fingerhood granted a motion to restrain JNF from using a map of Israel that included all of its annexed and administered territories.
The judge agreed with the ad hoc committee that the map was “misleading,” because it does not reflect JNF’s policy of not allocating funds for projects beyond the “Green Line,” the name commonly given the boundary between Israel proper and the administered territories.
Paskow told JTA that JNF clearly stated that policy in writing in all of its fund raising. He said the map was an “insignificant” part of the campaign.
Michael Teplow, a spokesman for the ad hoc committee, said it initiated the legal action last October to restrain JNF “from continuing the use of their misleading ads and a return of past donations obtained through misrepresentation.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
