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NIF is Investing in Ecosystems, Not Just Emergencies
We are only beginning to understand the outcome of the last 12 days of war between Israel, Iran, and (on the last day) the United States. We do not yet know the extent of the damage Israel and the U.S. were able to inflict on Iran’s nuclear capabilities. We don’t yet have a full picture of how this shakeup will resound across the broader region, or even exactly how these 12 days will affect Israeli public opinion (although our friend the pollster Dahlia Scheindlin has initial analysis that you can read here).
We do not even know if this war is technically over, though Israel’s Home Front Command did announce that life should return to normal. One meme I saw had President Trump holding up a document upon which the author had written: “Yesh Gan Machar” (“There is daycare tomorrow”). The caption read: “Thank you, Mr. President.”
Even though this latest war lasted just twelve days—albeit 12 days of death and destruction in Tel Aviv, Tehran and beyond—the Iran-Israel war of June, 2025, was yet another pivotal moment in the Middle East in a 22 month period that has seen many of them.
Think about it: In a stunning example of the law of unintended consequences, Iran’s support for Hamas and its October 7 attack on Israel led to a series of profound events: the destruction of Gaza, the crushing of Hezbollah (another Iranian proxy) in Lebanon, the collapse of Iran’s Syrian client state and, ultimately, an Israeli-US attack on Iranian territory. The Islamic Republic emerged radically weakened, its stability and perhaps even its leadership thrown into doubt.
At a time of so much uncertainty in the region and the world, we cannot predict what will happen next. But, we do know one thing that is true: Jews, Arabs, Iranians, Gazans, and West Bank Palestinians deserve better than what their leadership is offering. All of us—every one of us—is born free, and is of equal and infinite worth. That is the founding promise of both American and Israeli democracy, and the animating idea of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These are the promises that we live by. They are aspirational, certainly, but these values are our north star—the standard we will continue to apply to our governments—and insist on for ourselves.
Former State Department official and peace negotiator Aaron David Miller (who was featured on the Ezra Klein’s show yesterday) recently said of NIF that we are “idealists without illusions,” quoting Jack Kennedy. That, he said, is why he joined our board of directors.
I’m so honored by that description. Because if we are all born equal—we all deserve better—and that is what NIF works for every day. We all deserve to be safe. And for any of us to be safe, all of us need to be safe.
That’s why NIF’s response to the cascade of crises of the past several years has been to invest in ecosystems, not just emergencies. To support and strengthen partners and local leaders with whom we have built trusting relationships. To respond strategically to Israel’s deep, ongoing challenges. Here are just some examples of our recent work on the ground:
- With 50 hostages still held by Hamas, 22 of whom are believed to be still alive, we continue to support the Hostage Families Forum, the organization of families of the hostages still in Gaza. We have supported the Forum from day one, and will continue to do so until all of the hostages are home.
- The horrific war in Gaza has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians and hundreds of soldiers. Widespread hunger life-threatening queues for food distribution are the everyday reality for millions of Gazans. We continue to raise funds for trusted relief organizations to provide food and other aid to those who need it most.
- Israel’s far-right government has revived its assault on Israel’s democratic institutions and values under the cover of war. Israelis’ freedoms of expression, protest, and movement need more protection than ever as the authorities arrest protestors, exploit the state of national emergency to violate basic freedoms, and work to undermine the Israeli judicial system at every turn. We continue to defend core freedoms with coordinated and strategic efforts to protect both individual rights and democratic space.
- Palestinians in the West Bank face severe closures that restrict their movement as well as attacks from violent settler gangs. With extremely limited access to any legal recourse, they are struggling to simply remain on their own land. Just yesterday, three Palestinians were killed when settlers attacked a Palestinian village near Ramallah. NIF and its partners continue to support protective presence work—activists who go to villages and put their bodies on the line to offer physical support and protection to Palestinians under threat.
- The war against Iran has exposed the depth of the neglect and structural discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel, particularly in the Negev in unrecognized Bedouin villages. With no bomb shelters, too many Arab citizens of Israel are unprotected from missile attacks. And beyond bringing shelters and advocating for warning sirens, our support is aimed at building long-term infrastructure—the knowledge accumulated and models developed will serve Palestinian society in days to come.
The dominant narrative in Israel today frames endless, eternal war as the only available path. But this moment demands more than force; it demands diplomacy, imagination, responsibility, and long-term vision. NIF has long invested in cultivating policy frameworks for a peaceful and secure future and continues to support a cohort of policy experts. These include former Deputy Head of National Security Council Eran Etzion. Etzion is a resident Iran expert at Mitvim, a progressive applied think tank we are proud to support. (He appeared on our NIF webinar this week which you can access here.) We also work with educators and policy experts working to chart a different future—one that is rooted in peace, justice, security, and regional cooperation.
As M. Gessen said this week on the NYT Opinions podcast: “The only thing that can possibly work [against rising authoritarianism] is a visionary, loud, appealing alternative, rather than a milder form of the same thing that the very charismatic aspiring autocrat is offering.”
That’s just the sort of vision NIF is working to advance in Israel today. And the civil infrastructure NIF and our partners have built in recent years was designed precisely for moments like these. Now is the time to support civil society on the ground.
Now is the time to get involved. Join us.
