Activities

• Promotes a one-sided approach to the conflict, placing sole blame for the failure of the peace process on Israel. The complexities of the situation in Jerusalem – including illegal building and crime in Palestinian neighborhoods, damage to the Temple Mount as a result of illegal digging by the Waqf, and incitement to violence against Jews by extremist clerics – are erased.
• Lobbies intensively against policies and projects undertaken by the Israeli government and Jerusalem municipality designed to benefit the city’s residents, Arab and Jewish. For instance, regarding the Mount Scopus National Park, which was created “to protect against illegal building, which could destroy the last green area in east Jerusalem” and to “fight against criminals who throw trash and private individuals who try to appropriate the land,” Terrestrial Jerusalem alleges that “the clear goal of this park is to take land away from Palestinian residents and make it available for future Israeli development.”
• Founder Danny Seidemann has claimed that Israel’s actions in Jerusalem are “contributing to the transformation of a resolvable national-political conflict into an intractable mix of jihad, war of mitzvah, and Armageddon – a religious war driven by the Biblical imagery.”
• In November 2024, Seidemann tweeted, “A simple statement of fact. Without the active complicity of the JNF, the most toxic Israeli settlement in East Jerusalem, Silwan/the City of David, would not have been possible. Full stop. That means JNF engaged in displacement of Palestinian families under our occupation.”
• In February 2023, in response to comments claiming that “Antisemitism today is mainly the demonization, delegitimization, and double standards applied to Israel,” Seidemann tweeted, “Bullshit like this trivializes, manipulates and whitewashes real anti-semitism (which is a real threat), distorts and weaponizes the term to stifle criticism of Israel, while giving a pass to teppichfresser anti-semites as long as they ignore occupation and support settlements.”
• In November 2022, Seidemann tweeted, “The more we bully folks into not using “the ‘A’ word (apartheid) the more we display manifestations tantamount to apartheid.”
• In April 2022, Seidemann stated that excavations in Israel are “being used as a pretext to displace Palestinians…This is one of the places where manifestations of policies reminiscent of apartheid hit you over the head.”
• In May 2020, Seideman tweeted, “For many years I resisted using the term “apartheid” in the context of occupation. I regret having to use it now, but there is no choice but to do so.”
• In May 2018, Terrestrial Jerusalem was featured extensively in PAX Netherlands’ report, “Fragmented Jerusalem,” that claims “the decision to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem has already had a highly detrimental effect, sparking both renewed Palestinian violence and a resumption of initiatives to expel Palestinians from their homes on disputed land in Sheikh Jarrah.”
• In response to the installation of metal detectors at the Temple Mount to increase security following a terrorist attack that killed two Israeli Border Police officers in July 2017, Seidemann tweeted, “No gadget can be effective in blocking the drive for liberty. The new mechanisms may make Palestinian lives miserable -they won’t stop them.”
• On July 4, 2017, Seidemann spoke at a Council for Arab-British Understanding (CAABU) briefing on “Jerusalem, 50 Years On: Unification or Occupation?” stating that “Israel has a choice…either it can have its united Jerusalem, or it can have international legitimacy. It cannot have both.” Seidemann furthered that “while it used to be a ‘benign’ occupation that existed,” it was now an “’unapologetic’ and ‘metastasizing’ occupation which exercises constant collective punishment” (emphasis added).
• In July 2017, Seidemann stated in an interview with the World Council of Churches (WCC) that “For most of the time since 1967, the occupation of the West Bank has been military, while it has been of a more colonial nature in east Jerusalem. There is no military rule there, although the Israelis crush anything more radical than a scout meeting. And Palestinians are permanently politically disempowered.”
• In a June 2017 interview with the BBC, Seidemann stated that the “greatest threat to the Jewish people in this generation to be perpetual occupation and Israelis are in a state of clinical denial.” When asked “What’s the mechanism that brings Israel to an end if you don’tdisengage from occupation,” Seidemann answered “Decay [and] isolation.”

Foreign donations based on reports to Israeli Registrar of Non-Profits (amounts in NIS)

2020-2023 figures based on quarterly reports