This is funny. Lev Leviev, the Russian-born Israeli diamond boss who has funded settlements in the West Bank and a fancy diamond store on Madison Avenue in New York, has boasted in a Russian Jewish publication that he gives money to Oxfam.
Well, Adalah-New York is leading the heroic battle to boycott Leviev’s new store and force an American reckoning with the colonial projects we casually support, and they fastened on the Oxfam statement. Adalah wrote to Oxfam to say it should give the neocolonialist money back.
As Oxfam has acknowledged, all of
Israel
‘s rapidly expanding settlements in the
Occupied
Palestinian
Territories
contravene international law.…The five settlements in which Leviev has built homes seize vital Palestinian water resources and agricultural land, carving the
West Bank
into disconnected enclaves and rendering the creation of a viable Palestinian state impossible.
Then Oxfam called Adalah to say that Leviev was not a supporter.
Adalah-NY
confirmed yesterday with Oxfam America and Oxfam Great Britian that,
contrary to reports in a number of print and on-line publications,
Israeli billionaire and settlement-builder Lev Leviev is not and has
never been a donor to any of the Oxfam member organizations.
Adalah is "investigating." The Oxfam claim apparently showed up in mainstream publications, like Women’s Wear Daily.
