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Jewish National Fund (Israel)

Keren Kayemet LeYisrael, JNF, Kakal

Last modified: 2023-11-18 by martin karner
Keywords: jewish national fund | keren kayemet leyisrael | jnf | kakal | zionism | tree (white) | triangle (blue) | trapezoid (green) | text: hebrew (grey) | text: hebrew (black) |
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[Jewish National Fund (Israel)]       [Jewish National Fund (Israel)] images located by Esteban Rivera (left) and William Garrison
(obverse)                                                                  (reverse)


See also:

Introduction

The Jewish National Fund (Keren Kayemet LeYisrael, in short Kakal or JNF) was founded in 1901 by the Zionist Federation as its tool for purchasing lands in the Ottoman's Empire territories. From their website:

The Fifth Zionist Congress in Basel, 1901 decides to establish Keren Kayemeth LeYisrael-Jewish National Fund (KKL-JNF), as proposed by Professor Zvi (Hermann) Schapira, in order to purchase land in Eretz Israel for the Jewish People.

In 1961, KakaL transferred its lands to governmental management (By Israel Lands Management) and concentrated in non-profitable land developement (foresting, parks, free camping sites and other resort activities etc.). Even though it officially belongs to the Zionist Federation, it should be considered as a governmental organization.
Dov Gutterman, 13 October 2001

Description

Flag of the "KKL-JNF Jewish National Fund" with its name in English initials: "KKL-JNF". KKL (Keren Kayemet LeYisrael,) was established in 1901 to acquire land on which a Jewish state could be established. Today [2022], it acts as owner-custodian for 13% of Israeli state lands, much of it now filled with planted trees; c. 2022.
Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com...
William Garrison, 12 September 2022

The Jewish National Fund was founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Syria (later Palestine Mandate, and subsequently Israel and the Palestinian territories) for Jewish settlement. The JNF is a non-profit organization. Since its inception, the JNF says it has planted over 240 million trees in Israel. It has also built 180 dams and reservoirs, developed 250'000 acres (1000 km²) of land and established more than 1000 parks. The idea of a national land purchasing fund was first presented at the First Zionist Congress in 1897 by Hermann Schapira, a German-Jewish professor of mathematics. The organization is abbreviated as " קק״ל" (English: KKL) (romanized version: Keren Kayemeth Leisrael), previously named "הפאנד הלאומי" (English: The National Fund) (romanized version Keren Hakayemet). It was formally established at the Fifth Zionist Congress in Basel in 1901.

The flag change took place in 2008 when the brown color was added. Brown symbolizes the connection with earth, green symbolizes the KKL's responsibility and blue symbolizes water. One can also see the flag with inscription in Hebrew in black capitals below (2008 version) here:
https://www.haaretz.co.il (source: https://www.themarker.com/realestate/1.2271052)

Sources:
https://www.kkl.org.il/profile/about-kkl-jnf,
https://www.kkl-jnf.org/kkl_jnf_our_history_decade_by_decade,
https://www.kkl-jnf.org/second_decade_1901_1910,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKbWSM_hMIQ and
https://he.wikipedia.org/wiki

I previously had located graphic evidence that both flags (the 1998 version and the 2008 version) coexisted (image: https://scontent.cdninstagram.com/, source: https://www.pikdo.online/tag/PoweredbyJNF) but unfortunately the image and the source are no longer available online.

It is important to notice that other Jewish National Fund organizations exist outside Israel but have different symbols (i.e. JNF Canada and JNF US).

Image located:
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2017-08-04/, source: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2017-08-04/ty-article/jnf-in-america-essentially-stops-funding-its-israeli-counterpart/0000017f-e73a-dc7e-adff-f7bfd7920000

Esteban Rivera, 13 September 2022


Colour Variant

[JNF flag] image located by William Garrison

A variant with a bigger brown section. (picture, source)
located by William Garrison, 13 November 2023


Variant with new logo

[Flag with New Logo]       [New Logo] images located by Esteban Rivera
                                             logo

There seems to be a new flag featuring a new logo at least since 2015. The flag is a white background with the logo in the middle (Source: www.jnf.org...; article is dated Jan 7, 2015)
Esteban Rivera, 6 February 2023


Variant "JNF, for ISRAEL forever"

[JNF flag]       [JNF logo] images located by William Garrison
                                                                                       logo

This variant has been taken from a US website. It is not clear if this flag has its origins in Israel or in the United States. (source)
located by William Garrison, 13 November 2023

Previous flag (1998–2008)

[Jewish National Fund (Israel)]
image by Dov Gutterman | 2:3


The previous flag was in use from 1998 until 2008.
Esteban Rivera, 13 September 2022

Its flag is its logo in flag form.
Dov Gutterman, 13 October 2001

I've just seen a documentary that shows a somewhat different flag: White, with a logo centered (rather than filling the flag), and the name of the organization above it.
Nathan Lamm, 14 August 2005

Logo Evolution (until 2008)

[Jewish National Fund (Israel)] image located by Esteban Rivera

Source: cropped image from the original located here: https://he.wikipedia.org/wiki (source: https://he.wikipedia.org/)
For additional information go to KKL (official website): https://www.kkl.org.il/
Esteban Rivera, 13 September 2022