Don't sign up for the JNF, Ed

A lengthy group of names have signed off an open letter in today's Guardian to Ed Miliband, new leader of the UK's Labour Party, calling on him to break with the modern Labour Party tradition of patronising, albeit honorarily, the ethnic cleansers of the Jewish National Fund:

We welcome Ed Miliband's statement that Labour's foreign policy should be "based on values, not just alliances" (Leader's speech, 29 September). For too long Britain has blindly followed the US in supporting Israel, right or wrong. There is one, immediate decision Ed Miliband can make which will show that these are not empty words. Both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were patrons of the Jewish National Fund. We urge Ed Miliband to break from this tradition.

The JNF is actively complicit in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. For example, it established the Canada Park in the West Bank on the ruins of the villages of Imwas, Yalu and Beit Nuba. Today in Israel's Negev region it plays a major role in the establishment of exclusively Jewish settlements and the demolition of "unrecognised" Arab villages.

The JNF was founded in 1901 with the aim of purchasing land "for the purpose of settling Jews on such lands and properties". To this day it refuses to lease or rent land to anyone who is not Jewish. In 1953 and 1961, Israeli legislation made the JNF responsible for the land allocation policies of the state itself. In 1995 the Israeli supreme court, in the Ka'adan case, ruled that the JNF's partner, the Israeli Lands Administration, could no longer discriminate against Israeli Arabs by refusing to lease or rent state lands to them. This was held to be equally applicable to the JNF. The response of the JNF was that Israel was first and foremost a Jewish state not a state of its own citizens. Ed Miliband stood as the candidate of change in the Labour party. Now is the time to show that these weren't just words of spin.

Tony Greenstein

Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi

Emeritus Professor Moshe Machover

Michael Mansfield QC

Dr Chris Burns Cox

Professor David Pegg,

Leon Rosselson

Dr Sue Blackwell

Pete Firmin,

Abe Hayeem

Professor Myriam Salama-Carr,

Dr Rumy Hasan

Roland Rance

Dr Monica Wusterman

Deborah Fink

Jackie Alsaid

Ken Baker St Jerome Publishing

Professor Mona Baker

David Bangs

Dr Judith Brown

Ruth Clark

Adam Darwish

James Dickins

Greg Dropkin

Jackie Fearnley

Alf Filer

Naomi Foyle Brighton Palestine Solidarity Campaign

Kenny Fryde

Terry Gallogly

Anne Gray

Cliff Hanley

Rosamine Hayeem

Bob Jarrett

Ros Levy

Kevin Moore

Beryl Maizells

Zoe Mars Chair, Brighton & Hove Palestine Solidarity Campaign

John Metson

Safiya O'Donnell

Nicola Ostreicher

Ernesto Paramo

Dinah Rahman

Roger Reeve

Professor Dee Reynolds

Michael Sackin

Miriam Scharf East London NUT

Michael Shanahan

Ruth Tenne Israeli Human Rights Activist

Yvette Vanson

I gather there were some editing issues.

For more on the JNF see Gabriel's post on the Canadian branch of that racist organisation.