The Jewish National Fund (JNF) and its Role in the Zionist Movement in Palestine (1901: 1948)

The establishment of the Jewish National Fund (JNF) in 1901 has been a turning point in the history of the Zionist movement. It played a prominent role in serving the Zionist project, as it was the most important Zionist institution and the cornerstone of the Jewish national home project.

This study – which is originally a PhD thesis discussed in Modern History major at Ain Shams University – sought to search for the role played by the JNF as a Zionist institution that emerged from the Zionist organization and played an important role in seizing the lands of Palestine from 1901 until 1948. Whereas through the Mandate Government’s embrace of the Zionist project, it was able to seize parts of the land of Palestine and establish settlements on it to receive Zionist immigrants from all over the world. The JNF was provided with all the British procedures and legislations that paved the way for establishing the Zionist entity on the land of Palestine.

The JNF launched the Zionist activity from the stage of Zionist ideas and visions to the stage of implementation and practical application of the principles that the Zionist movement called for including the occupation of land and work, which was entirely applied and was the most important foundation that allowed it to tighten its control over the Palestinian land that it seizes. Those principles shown the real face of this usurping entity, which not only took the saying “a land without a people for a people without a land” as a slogan, but also worked to implement it in a racist and blatant manner, violating all religious, historical and legal rights of the Palestinian people in their land to cause a demographic imbalance in favor of the Zionist project.

The Zionist propaganda carried out by the JNF among Jewish communities in the world countries had a significant role in allowing it continue its work. Donations, grants and financial loans arrived from Jewish governments, institutions and individuals who played an important role in covering its activities. Hence, Fund committees left no method of Collecting donations unless linked to the Torah to make Jews, wherever they are, donate to the JNF in application to religious beliefs that have been enshrined for some of them.

Undoubtedly, the JNF worked to exploit its relations inside the United States to obtain significant financial support. The United States has been the largest donor to the JNF, which means that its role before 1948 was no less than the support that the Zionist project obtained from Britain. The JNF’s job has also been characterized by integration with the rest of the Zionist institutions within the Zionist organization. Zionist competition was to support immigration and settlement, regardless of the deep differences that were sidelined when it came to the common Zionist goal.