Liberal dark money network has donated $10M to anti-Israel causes
Editor’s note: This article was revised on Nov. 18, and Nov. 20, 2023.
One of the largest left-wing dark money networks has funneled more than $10 million to anti-Israel causes over the past five years, according to records reviewed by The Post, as the embattled Jewish state faces calls for its destruction in demonstrations across the US during its war against Hamas terrorists.
Washington, DC-based Arabella Advisors contributes to an array of progressive nonprofits through its New Venture Fund, Hopewell Fund, Sixteen Thirty Fund, North Fund, and Windward Fund, which have given a combined $10,833,396 to anti-Israel groups since 2018.
Those nonprofits have gone on to support radical Palestinian activist groups that have been linked to terrorism and agitated against US support for Israel in the wake of the Oct. 7 terror attack by Hamas jihadists that killed more than 1,400 people — including at least 33 Americans.
The largest share went to NEO Philanthropy, which collected $5,161,465 from four of the five funds since 2018, and runs a project founded by antisemitic activist Linda Sarsour.
MPower Change, Sarsour’s project, circulated false information from Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry about casualties from a missile that struck a hospital last week — despite US intelligence and the Israeli military confirming that terrorists fired the rocket.
The group also promoted a Democratic Socialists of America-led rally in New York City this month, where protesters displayed antisemitic signs including a Nazi swastika.
Caitlin Sutherland, the executive director of Americans for Public Trust, which asked the IRS to investigate Arabella Advisors in August, told The Post that the dark money network’s donors “should be mortified that their money is being routed to organizations leading blatantly antisemitic, pro-terrorist pep rallies.”
“The network should immediately ask for their money back from these radical groups, and Arabella’s financial backers should reconsider the cost of supporting a network that is tacitly endorsing an alarming movement of hate aimed at Jewish communities across our country,” Sutherland said.
Another activist group, One Arizona, has received $2,327,000 from the New Venture Fund, Hopewell Fund and Windward Fund since 2018, according to tax filings collected by ProPublica.
The group sponsors the Arizona Asian American Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander for Equity, which called on followers in an Instagram post “to support Palestine and the fight against western imperialism.”
During Israel’s last conflict with Hamas in May 2021, the Alliance for Youth Action, which has taken $2,200,000 from the Sixteen Thirty Fund since 2018, referred to the rocket attacks launched from Gaza as a “fight for liberation.”
The Black Alliance for Just Immigration, which received $400,000 in 2019 and 2020, also said amid the conflict that “Israel’s occupation” and US support for its “genocide” against Palestinians was “unconscionable.”
The Alliance for Global Justice also took $473,000 from the Windward Fund and New Venture Fund, tax filings from 2020 and 2021 show, even as it sponsored the Israeli-designated terrorist group Samidoun.
The Washington Examiner first reported on those terror links last year, prompting Mastercard, Visa, American Express and Paypal to bar Samidoun from their payment processing services.
The Alliance for Global Justice has responded to the Hamas attacks by circulating statements from Venezuela’s authoritarian leader Nicolas Maduro against Israel and referring to its military response as a “Zionist onslaught.”
Another group, Grassroots for Global Justice, has taken $110,000 since 2019 from the Windward Fund, according to tax filings, funneling the money to organizations like the Palestinian Youth Movement, which blamed Israel for Hamas’ atrocities and held rallies in Washington, DC, and New York City.
“They’ve got tanks; we’ve got hang gliders,” a speaker for the Palestinian Youth Movement said at the protest in the Big Apple, referencing Hamas terrorists who paraglided into an Israeli music festival to massacre 260 civilians.
“Glory to all the resistance fighters,” the speaker said.
The IfNotNow Movement, which has raked in $62,000 since 2020 from the Sixteen Thirty Fund, helped organize protests earlier this month at the White House and US Capitol and has stated that “Israel’s apartheid system” provoked the terrorist attacks.
The New Venture Fund also gave $40,000 to the Arizona chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which shared a template on Instagram to help others denounce school administrators or employers who issue statements “in support of Israel.”
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who refuses to retract a false statement of her own about the Gaza hospital explosion, will also be the keynote speaker at a CAIR Arizona banquet on Nov. 18.
Other groups like the Education for Liberation Network and Muslims for Progressive Values, which received roughly $60,000 from the New Venture Fund combined, have taught schoolchildren that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a “struggle against occupation” and suggested that reports of Hamas raping women and burning Israeli parents and children alive were false.
Arabella Advisors’ network of funds has reported more than $1 billion in total revenue each year since 2020, according to reports on tax filings.
Founded in 2005 by former Clinton administration official Eric Kessler, the for-profit firm is not required to disclose its donors, though left-wing billionaires George Soros and Pierre Omidyar have volunteered multimillion-dollar contributions to funds in its network, the New York Times has reported.
Arabella maintains that its grants were not used for any purposes related to the current conflict in Israel and that grants provided by Arabella’s nonprofit clients to the referenced organizations were used for projects and purposes that have nothing to do with the Israel-Palestine conflict.
The Funds maintain that no funding to NEO Philanthropy has gone to “support terrorism, antisemitism, or Nazism. Rather, the Funds have provided grants to NEO Philanthropy to support causes such as reproductive rights, public interest technology, criminal justice reform, and census engagement.”
The Funds maintain that “the grants that the Funds have provided to One Arizona have nothing to do with
supporting Palestine or fighting against ‘western imperialism.’ Rather, the funds have been used for projects aimed at civic engagement in the State of Arizona, including, for example, projects intended to help historically marginalized groups become part of the redistricting process in the United States.
The Funds maintain that “the funds that Sixteen Thirty Fund provided to Alliance for Youth Action had nothing to do with Gaza and related to election reforms designed to increase voter turnout in the United States.”
Regarding the Black Alliance for Just Immigration, the Funds maintain that “money was provided by the Funds to this organization for the purpose of promoting outreach and education concerning the 2020 US census.”
The Funds maintain that “the New Venture Fund and the Windward Fund have provided no money to Samidoun and instead provided grants to Alliance for Global Justice for domestic clean energy projects, such as redevelopment of an oil refinery in Philadelphia, and to help young [black] people in Chicago get access to education. Furthermore, the Funds have discontinued grants and will no longer provide future funding to the Alliance for Global Justice.”
The Funds maintain that “the Windward Fund provided no funds to the Palestinian Youth Movement. Rather, the Windward Fund provided a grant to Grassroots for Global Justice specifically for its labor advocacy project, Black Workers for Justice.”
The Funds maintain that “the grant provided by the Sixteen Thirty Fund to the IfNotNow Movement was actually used to pursue strategies to oppose antisemitism.”
The Funds maintain that “the grant provided by the New Venture Fund” to the Council on American-Islamic Relations’ Arizona chapter “was for improving civic engagement and voting rights in the State of Arizona. It had nothing to do with Israel.”
Regarding the Education for Liberation Network and Muslims for Progressive Values, the Funds maintain “the grants provided by the New Venture Fund have nothing to do with teaching children about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or Hamas. Rather, the New Venture Fund grants were used for such causes as nurturing communities of thoughtful and socially-engaged people and social media campaigns in Burundi and Kenya.”
“We condemn terrorism and violence against civilians in all forms and do not support any projects or provide any grants to organizations that fund terrorism,” Lee Bodner, president of New Venture Fund, told The Post in a statement.
“New Venture Fund is discontinuing grants to any projects hosted by Alliance for Global Justice.”
“The Windward Fund is no longer providing grants for organizations that are sponsored by the Alliance for Global Justice,” Lynn McNair, president of the Windward Fund, also told the Post in a statement.
“Our organization does not support terrorism in any form and strongly denounce any violence against civilians.”
