Special Interview with Benshemesh

Despite the uncertainty of the future status of the territories taken by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War, the Jewish National Fund (Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael) is purchasing and developing land in those areas, “In fact it is our policy not to turn down any offer for land purchasing,” Shimon Benshemesh, director general of the JNF in Jerusalem said in an interview today with JTA.

“We buy real estate in the administered territories from anyone who is willing to sell them, regardless of the political future of those territories,” he said, “Maybe we will have to give up that land in any future settlement without getting anything for it in return. Maybe we will have to barter this land for another, but for the time being, the JNF buys any available land.”

According to Benshemesh the JNF has already purchased and developed land in the West Bank, especially in the vicinity of Jerusalem, the Jordan Valley, the Golan Heights and northern Sinai. “Arab landlords sometimes show surprising willingness to sell land, especially those landowners who reside abroad,” he said.

Benshemesh, who arrived here for a four-week tour of the U.S. and Canada on behalf of the JNF and its planned $6 million Bicentennial project near Jerusalem, disclosed that contributions this year to the JNF throughout the world will exceed last year’s by more than 16 percent, Last year’s contributions to the JNF totalled $12 million, half of it raised in the U.S. Benshemesh said that the world-wide recession did not affect contributions to the JNF because “the economic crisis hit the big contributor and the JNF gets its contributions from small donors.”

About his current visit here, Benshemesh said: “I am deeply touched by the love and concern that American Jewry is showing about anything that concerns Israel. I think that the task of the JNF nowadays is to reach as many Jewish households as possible. Not because of the fund-raising aspect, but because this is a bridge between Israel and the diaspora.”