US law is far more onerous than this. Anyone taking money from a foreign source who lobbies the US Congress must register as a foreign agent. This criticism is absurd.

I guess the US is opposed to an apartheid system.

when foreign governments fund fringe NGO's attempting to affect change in Israel, I think it is safe to assume that in some way "they engage in certain specified activities at the order, request, or under the direction or control, of a foreign principal". To think otherwise would be extremely naive.

Together with the 'left in Israel, they don't stop condemning this NGO bill! Shaked must do something very, very right! It was long overdue!

Shapiro should use those high sounding words on the Obama administration, which is trying to get certain (that means conservative) non-profit organizations to collect social security numbers from doners. The reason for it is obvious in light of the IRS's ongoing war on conservative organizations. The difference here is that Israel is trying to cut off foreign enemy influence in their government, while Obama does the opposite over here with Muslims in key positions in Dept. of Homeland Security, and Muslim convert John Brennan as head of the CIA. But Obama's ambassador presumes to tell Israel what to do. Puke!

It seems to me that transparency would only hurt those with something to hide.

It seems to me that AJC take sides.

keep in mind that the jewish state is a sovereign state. as such, the jewish state determines exclusively how to protect its national security interests against hostile interference from foreign governments and foreign entities. israeli ngo's that are substantially funded by foreign governments are ipso facto under the influence of those foreign governments. foreign governments would not fund ngo's whose political goals were different from theirs. the goal of obama, the eu, and their ngo's is to dictate to israel her policies regarding the arab palestinians and to impose a final solution to the arab israel conflict. this has nothing whatever to do with democracy, of which israel has in abundance, but with the foreign policies of these foreign governments. it is noteworthy that obama and his european partners are all willing to make a fake, detrimental deal with the chief terror state of iran and allow that state to keep a nuclear weapons program. while obama keeps violating the us constitution and us laws, israel imprisons even the highest officials of her land if they violate the law. israel has a very robust free press, free assembly, freedom of religion, academic freedom. israel does not need the nations to lecture her about the freedoms that find their source originally in the torah.

I find all of this a bit odd. If I am not mistaken, democracy is of the people. The people of the place/entity. A government or an entity that is not of the place is outside of that democracy. Is it wrong to have transparency in funding? In the United States, all political donations are transparent by law. Charitable organizations are also required to provided transparent data regarding their funding. According to reports, the Ambassador of the United States to Israel said that the US law regarding foreign agents only applied to those that received direct instructions from another government. However, a lesson we learned from Watergate was "follow the money". Whoever pays the bills has control of the actions. Not to suggest ill will on any government or any suggestion that a government my wish to cause ill to Israel, but would the United States stood quietly if Germany during World War 2 was funding NGOs in the US, During the Cold War the USSR was doing the same. If there is nothing to hide, way the drama of opposition by foreign entities? What is the problem with full and complete openness if everything is for the good? One would think that the US and the EU would be proud of their help, their assistance, and their chessed and not try to hide behind the curtain.