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Keren Kayemet Le-Israel Law, 5714-1953

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aliasesJewish National Fund Law 1953, Keren Kayemet Le-Israel Law

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Summary

Israel’s Keren Kayemet Le-Israel Law, 5714-1953, passed 23 November 1953, incorporating the Keren Kayemet Le-Israel in Israel as a company limited by guarantee to continue the diaspora-incorporated existing company’s activities, with continuity of rights and powers, local-authority status for one land-acquisition purpose, and tax-free transfer of the existing company’s assets and liabilities to the new company (Keren Kayemet Le-Israel Law, 5714-1953 (1953), PDF p.1-3).

Details

  • Incorporation (sections 2-3, PDF p.1): the Minister of Justice may approve a memorandum and articles submitted by the existing company, the Keren Kayemet Le-Israel B.M. founded and incorporated in the Diaspora; on publication in Reshumot the new company is deemed registered under the Companies Ordinance and licensed under its section 23(1).
  • Continuity (sections 4-5, PDF p.1): every right or power vested by law in the existing company is also vested in the new company; Companies Ordinance section 112 and parts of section 121(1) do not apply to it.
  • Status and carve-outs (sections 6-7, PDF p.1): for section 22 of the Land (Acquisition for Public Purposes) Ordinance, 1943 the new company has the same status as a local authority; the Insurance Business (Superintendence) Law, 5711-1951 does not apply to its living legacy business.
  • Transfers (sections 8-10, PDF p.2): transfers proceed under a modified Companies Ordinance section 119A arrangement or, otherwise, on published notice with joint and several liability and floating charges carried over; all such transfers and consequential acts are exempt from any tax, fee or charge payable to the State or a local authority.
  • No land rule: the Law as printed states no purpose for the Fund, no rule that land is held for the Jewish people, and no bar on leasing or selling to non-Jews; its only land provision is the section 6 status. The memorandum and articles it authorises are not in the file.

Where sources disagree

  • The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine states that the JNF Law of 1953 granted the Fund independent status as land-owner on behalf of the Jewish state (PDF p.257-258). The primary text grants no land-owner status in those terms: it incorporates the new company, vests the existing company’s rights and powers in it, and gives it local-authority status only for section 22 of the 1943 Ordinance (Keren Kayemet Le-Israel Law, 5714-1953 (1953), PDF p.1). Both accounts are kept.

Keren Kayemet Le-Israel Law, 5714-1953 (1953), Jewish National Fund, Basic Law: Israel Lands, Knesset

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