In response to a request from Labor MK Naama Lazimi, the Knesset Finance Committee has decided to postpone its approval of the Ad Kan organization for receipt of Clause 46 and associated tax benefits, pending the Tax Authority’s examination of the nature of its operation.
Ad Kan is a right-wing organization which investigates activity which it suspects of being detrimental to the interests of the State of Israel, using various methods including infiltrating left-wing organizations and exposing its findings.
Lazimi had argued that the non-profit organization is not deserving of tax benefits, calling Ad Kan “an organization that persecutes peace and human rights activists, using criminal and dubious means, with anonymous donors,” and that therefore “it should not receive government money via tax benefits.”
Responding to the decision was MK Itamar Ben Gvir (Religious Zionism), who protested the move during the committee’s meeting and was ejected from the room by committee head MK Alex Kushnir (Yisrael Beytenu).
“This was a power-grab on the part of the left wing, enabled by the Bennett government and Finance Committee head Kushnir,” Ben Gvir said. “I had actually arrived for a different meeting, and suddenly heard that they were singling out the Ad Kan non-profit from all the corrupt left-wing non-profits, and preventing it from obtaining Clause 46 approval.
“Amazing that no one updated anyone on this, and that not a single representative of Ad Kan was invited [to defend their case], and that when MK Lazimi was asked to prove what she alleged - that Ad Kan has already been condemned - she began to stammer. What a disgrace,” Ben Gvir concluded.