Bibi Raises 96% of Cash From Overseas

Image by getty images
More than half of all donations made to Israeli politicians’ campaigns over the past two years came from overseas contributors.
Donations to political campaigns by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during that period amounted to $311,000, with 96.8 percent coming from outside Israel, according to Haaretz in a front page report on Friday. The paper wrote that Netanyahu received donations from several members of the Falick family from Miami, Florida.
In total, the paper found that Israeli politicians raised $3.3 million for their campaigns over the past two years, and that 53 percent of that sum “came from people who live overseas, cannot vote in Israel and are not directly impacted by the elected officials’ decisions.”
Tzipi Livni, former leader of Kadima, raised $415,000 from foreign contributors, or 58 percent of the total sum raised over the past two years, according to Haaretz.
Shaul Mofaz, the current leader of the party, raised $389,000 in total during that period, with 67 percent – or $260,000, coming from abroad. Avi Dichter, a former member of Kadima and currently a minister under Netanyahu, raised $83,000, out which $73,000 came from outside Israel.
The former leader of Israel’s Labor party, Amir Peretz, raised $141,000 outside Israel over the past two years – 42 percent of the total sum he raised.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Most Popular
- 1
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 2
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
- 3
Fast Forward Suspected arsonist intended to beat Gov. Josh Shapiro with a sledgehammer, investigators say
- 4
Opinion What Jewish university presidents say: Trump is exploiting campus antisemitism, not fighting it
In Case You Missed It
-
Opinion Shackled, imprisoned and subjected to false accusations, Kilmar Abrego Garcia recalls the fate of Captain Alfred Dreyfus
-
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
-
Culture In Pope Francis, a voice for interfaith dialogue and against antisemitism
-
Fast Forward Israeli army fires deputy commander after finding ‘operational errors’ in killing of 15 Gazans
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.