Update: Following the initial publication of this report, EU-funded NGOs B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights (PHR-I) published statements on July 28, 2025 (here and here) alleging the antisemitic “genocide” libel against Israel.

Newly released data on European Union websites reveal 14 grants totaling €7.2 million authorized by the European Commission in 2024 for projects involving highly politicized Israeli NGOs. These are part of 24 grants totalling €13.1 million announced under the EU Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument (NDICI). 

NGOs receiving EU funding in the year after the October 7 atrocities include groups that lead the “apartheid” libel and lawfare campaigns against Israel; use antisemitic rhetoric; and have lobbied for international sanctions, arrest warrants against Israeli officials, and arms embargoes targeting the Jewish state. Three grantees also parrot the “genocide” accusation, and one of them accused “the Israeli government and other entities have been exploiting reports of sexual violence [that took place on October 7th] in a manipulative and cynical manner.” 

Half of the EU grants ostensibly go to “preserve” a “two-state” framework, either by having fringe and uninfluential NGOs seeking to influence Israeli society (such as a project run by Breaking the Silence for “educating Israeli youth”) or by leveling politicized claims blaming Israel for blocking progress. Other grants claim to counter alleged “police violence” and torture of Palestinian terror suspects, highlighting a highly politicized internal Israeli agenda. In contrast, no EU grants involved advocacy on behalf of Israelis hostages being held in Gaza, victims of sexual violence during the October 7th attacks, families of Palestinian terror victims, or the hundreds of thousands Israelis displaced as a result of attacks by Hamas and Hezbollah. 

The grants were approved by the previous European Commission (that ran from December 2019 – November 2024) under High Representative and Vice President Josep Borrell (who was accused of antisemitism and intense hostility to Israel), and mark an increase by €5 million (more than double) compared to grants authorized to Israeli NGOs in 2023. 

Details about these grants were published in June 2025 amidst the lethal missile barrages from Iran and while the foreign ministers of the European Union debated an NGO-driven lobbying campaign to suspend its Association Agreement with Israel – a move that would have had severe political and economic consequences. 

In addition, ahead of a July 15, 2025 meeting of the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council, five EU-funded Israeli NGOs – Breaking the Silence, Combatants for Peace, Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), Physicians for Human Rights, and Bimkom, which all promote the antisemitic apartheid libel against Israel – sent a letter (alongside eight other groups) to the European Commission High Representative/Vice President Kaja Kallas, pressing for a review of the “full spectrum of systematic & escalating violations of human rights and humanitarian law- both in Gaza and in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.” The NGOs also demanded “accountability” for Israel.  

Analysis of funding in 2024 reveals continued EU support for NGO-led lawfare including arms embargo initiatives, efforts to undermine Israel’s right to defend itself, exploitation of human rights to increase Israeli isolation, and campaigns to influence Israeli political and policy making processes. 

Summary and brief analysis of the 2024 EU grants to Israeli NGOs:

• Seven grants totaling €3.67 million (50% of total funding) are designated for initiatives claiming to promote a two-state framework; with one exception, none expressly takes into account the altered geopolitical landscape post-October 7th. Recipients include the highly controversial and fringe organizations Breaking the Silence (BtS) and Combatants for Peace (CfP) that are unable to affect Israeli public opinion. Analysts note that  their biases make involvement counterproductive to the EU’s stated goals.
  
• For example,  €1 million grant is provided to Sabeel, a Jerusalem-based Christian organization known for using antisemitic imagery and theology, accusing Israel of genocide, and promoting “one state for two nations and three religions.” The project claims that this activity will “preserve from further erosion and possibly reverse the negative public perception of the prospect for peace and a two-state solution.” However, in a statement published by Sabeel for New Year’s 2025, Sabeel’s founder stated that “Our people will fear neither Israeli genocide nor Israeli erasure because, with our Muslim brothers and sisters, we say, God is Greater, knowing that God indeed stands above Israel’s evil snares and conspiracies and God will ultimately defeat the evil schemes of Zionism” (emphasis added). For more information on Sabeel, see NGO Monitor’s report “EU Funds NGO Promoting Antisemitic Imagery and Theology.”
• €500,000 was allocated to the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) and Physicians for Human Rights–Israel (PHR-I) for a project focusing on the rights of Palestinian detainees, including individuals involved in acts of terrorism.
  • On July 28, 2025, PHR-I published a report promoting the antisemitic genocide libel, accusing Israel of “a deliberate, cumulative, and ongoing dismantling of Gaza’s healthcare system – and of the population’s ability to survive. Its meaning: genocide.”
  • In 2024, PHR-I published a statement claiming that “Since October 7, the Israeli government and other entities have been exploiting reports of sexual violence in a manipulative and cynical manner. These reports have been utilized as part of a campaign to dehumanize Palestinians and as a propaganda tool to justify Israel’s brutal military assault on the Gaza Strip. This assault has resulted, and continues to result, in the deaths and injuries of tens of thousands of innocent civilians, the forced displacement and starvation of most of the Gaza Strip’s population, and extensive destruction of civilian infrastructure, including health facilities. We are appalled by this cynical exploitation of the victims’ suffering, condemn it, and view it as a complete abandonment of any moral integrity” (emphasis added).
• Advocacy NGOs such as B’Tselem and Breaking the Silence, which have been funded by the EU for many years, continue to receive grants – €410,000 in 2024, for projects falsely accusing Israel of pursuing a policy of forcible population transfer. B’Tselem has been a leader in promoting the antisemitic “apartheid” libel internationally, accusing Israel of being a “regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. In July 2025,B’Tselem published a report, “Our Genocide,” promoting the antisemitic genocide libel against Israel.
• €500,000 to the Zulat organization, aimed at supporting “legal protections” for protestors and documenting alleged “police misconduct” within Israel, and highlighting the EU’s blatant attempt to use NGO funding to influence Israel’s internal political and legal processes.

List of 2024 EU grants for projects implemented by Israeli NGOs

All details taken directly from EU websites – Financial Transparency System (FTS) and the Delegation of the European Union to the State of Israel.

1. Project Title: Faithful Futures: Religious Leaders for Accountability, Justice and Peace through the Two-State Solution

Partners: Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center; Rabbis For Human Rights
Amount: €1 million
Duration: 01/01/2025-30/09/2028
Description: The action seeks to preserve from further erosion and possibly reverse the negative public perception of the prospect for peace and a two-state solution.
See NGO Monitor’s report “EU Funds NGO Promoting Antisemitic Imagery and Theology”

2. Project Title: The Transfer Cannot Succeed: Holding Israeli Authorities Accountable for Forcible Transfer

Partners: B’Tselem, Breaking the Silence
Amount: €410,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2026
Description: This action aims to contribute enhance duty-bearer accountability and respect for International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights in the occupied Palestinian territories by urging international action and accountability for Israeli state-backed settler violence contributing to the ongoing forcible transfer of Palestinians.

3. Project Title: Behind Bars, Beyond Rights: Protecting Palestinian Detainees’ Rights and Promoting Accountability of Israeli Duty Bearers According to IHRL and IHL

Partners: Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI); Physicians for Human Rights (PHR-I)
Amount: €500,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2026
Description: The Action’s overall objective is to protect the lives of Palestinian detainees held in Israeli detention centres, including women and children, and safeguard them from torture and other forms of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment (TCIDT) and from violation of the right to health, by enhancing Israel’s accountability and respect for international human rights (IHRL) and humanitarian law (IHL).

4. Upholding the Democratic Principle of Freedom of Protest – Acting to ensure legal protections for the freedom of protest in Israel and the prevention of police violence

Partners: Zulat; Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI)
Amount: €500,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-30/06/2027
Description: The proposed project responds to the issue of legislative actions designed to curtail the rights of Israeli citizens to the key freedoms of assembly, association, and speech (the right to protest hereafter). It will promote the value of these rights as being integral to all human rights and as core pillars of the democratic process. The project will work with and enable rights activists to improve awareness and the perception of human rights by residents and citizens of Israel through campaign, advocacy, and legal work that will hold duty bearers to account. This will increase participation in citizen led community actions to grow support for greater accountability for human rights across the country.

5. Project Title: THE DAY AFTER, GAZA, AND THE EU: PERCEPTIONS OF ISRAELI POLICY SHAPERS

Partners: Molad
Amount: €59,874
Duration: 01/01/2025-30/06/2025

6. Project Title: Educating towards Peace: Educating Israeli Youth on the situation in the Palestinian territories

Partners: Breaking the Silence
Amount: €400,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2027
Description: The project aims to educate Israeli youth on the situation in the oPt so they might challenge misinformation, radicalization, and narratives that are contrary to a culture of peace, as such increasing tolerance and understanding of the other. It advances societal changes in Israel conducive to a climate favorable to peace-building and a just and negotiated two-state solution, as well as to achieve greater public support for a two-state solution in Israel, particularly among youth.

7. Project Title: Fostering a Culture of Peace through Israeli and Palestinian Youth Education and Transformation

Partners: Combatants for Peace (CfP)
Amount: €800,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2027
Description: This action will challenge trends of radicalization by engaging Israeli and Palestinian youth in in-depth educational programming, providing opportunities to partake in peace-building activities and accompanying them in initiating participant-led actions which will foster leadership. This action will contribute to societal changes in Israel and Palestine conducive to a climate favorable to peace-building and a just and negotiated two-state solution, promoting a culture of peace and human rights (including mutual understanding, tolerance, and trust). Focusing on youth ensures investment in the future generation of the region.

8. Project Title: Medical Ethics as a Catalyst: Advancing Human Rights in Israel’s Healthcare System

Partners: Physicians for Human Rights (PHR-I); SIKKUY AUFOQ – FOR A SHARED AND EQUAL SOCIETY
Amount: €480,359
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2026
Description: The overarching goal of the project is to advance the protection of human rights and bolster Israel’s healthcare community as an autonomous agent of good governance, ethics, and human rights. This will be achieved by rallying the medical community to champion ethical norms and push for policy reforms that promote accountability, transparency, and equality. By mobilizing healthcare professionals to uphold their professional and ethical autonomy, the project aims to reinforce the vital separation between the political and civil spheres, thereby fortifying the foundations of democracy.

9. Project Title: The Negev for All its Residents: inclusion of under-represented groups in decision making to plan a prosperous Negev

Partners: Bimkom
Amount: €500,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2027
Description: The project sets out to strengthen the capacities of Negev residents, women and men from marginalised communities, to influence Negev rehabilitation policies and plans, and their implementation; and to hold Israeli duty bearers (DBs) accountable for promoting rehabilitation plans for the entire Negev region, that will address the current sectoral and spatial segregation, reduce inequalities and increase social, economic and political inclusion.

10. Project Title: Make room for women’s voices and women’s leadership in decision-making processes in Israel

Partners: Friedrich Ebert Foundation; Itach Maaki; Mossawa Center; Nivcharot; WePower
Amount: €500,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2026
Description: The action seeks to empower civil society organizations and existing and aspiring women leaders from all parts of Israeli society, especially from underrepresented groups, to actively participate in decision-making processes and public discourse.

11. Project Title: EDUCATIONAL FILMMAKING WORKSHOPS AND CULTURAL EVENTS IN MIXED COMMUNITIES

Partners: SOLIDARITY FOR ART ACTIVISM AND HUMAN RIGHTS
Amount: €60,000
Duration: 15/01/2025-14/01/2027
Description: 

12. Project Title: A Time for Peace – Campaigning for a Two-State Solution

Partners: S.H.A.’A.L. – PEACE NOW FOR ISRAEL EDUCATIONAL ENTERPRISES
Amount: €724,115
Duration: 01/02/2025-31/01/2028
Description: This project aims at fostering civil society’s leverage on public discourse in support of a just and negotiated two-state solution in Israel and Palestine. More specifically, it seeks to work towards enhancing civil society’s advocacy efforts with decision makers on the policy level in favour of a just and negotiated two-state solution, as well as fostering the participation in a Two State Solution of groups on the societal level, including groups who are not currently supportive of it.

13. Project Title: Women’s Testimony Redefining Peace Leadership

Partners: Itach Maaki
Amount: €528,401
Duration: 01/01/2025-31/12/2027
Description: The project aims at mainstreaming gender lenses in public discourse and policy regarding conflict transformation, and promoting the role of women as agents of positive change, to deepen and enhance efforts towards a just and negotiated two-state solution in Israel and Palestine.

14. Project Title: ‘Evolving Peace’ – an Israeli blueprint to re-establish the two-state solution as the strategic and viable ‘day-after’ regional reality

Partners: BERL KATZNELSON FOUNDATION
Amount: €750,000
Duration: 01/01/2025-30/06/2027
Description: The action is designed to increase Israeli public and political support for the Two-State Solution (TSS) among strategic policy, political, civil, and security-related stakeholders and young leaders by developing an applicable realistic blueprint premised on a paradigmatic shift on peace and security that will resonate in the government, security establishment, media and public in Israel. The action aims to establish ‘Evolving Peace’ as the prevailing theoretical framework, challenging existing notions of security and peace, to effectively outline trust-building measures, extensive security coordination mechanisms, and regional oversight as interim steps to create a new reality on the ground that is more conducive to the Two-State Solution (TSS).