New vigour in Smith’s Israel-bashing

Janet Smith has emerged from what seems a long absence from print media, but this absence has not dampened her zest for vilifying and hatred for Israel, when writing in the Mail & Guardian about Israel’s forays into Africa (“Israel joins the new scramble for Africa”, September 1).

What seems to really get up her nose is that Israel’s diplomatic initiative in Africa is becoming increasingly effective as many African countries are putting the interests of their people first, something that Smith and our politicians can’t see.

Rather than import a completely painless circumcision device called PrePlex from Israel, which could save the lives of hundreds of botched circumcisions of young initiates, the ANC’s view is rather to let them die a terrible death.

There are any number of humanitarian inventions and initiatives that Israel can offer Africa to ease the lives of its people, from high-tech irrigation schemes to feed millions, first-world medicine and also security — but Smith wouldn’t have that — rather let the people suffer. That’s when hatred defeats practicality.

Here’s the thing that Smith and her friends from the BDS [Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions] movement — whose call to shoot the Jew, “dubula iJuda”, still resonates — can’t get their heads around: they refuse to look back and acknowledge that there needs be no occupation, no blockade of Gaza and none of the other conditions she lists given that the Palestinian Authority was offered a safe, independent and economically viable state on three occasions — all under a different Israeli leadership than the current government. All on far better terms than are being discussed today.

Why, Smith, do we still have an occupation? In her Goebbelian style she tells us that this is the only occupation in the world. Did she forget Cyprus or Tibet or Western Sahara? But then geopolitics is not her strong point when in Israeli-bashing mode.

Isn’t it comforting when Smith tells us that South Africa has an ambassador to Syria? Could that be the same Syria whose demented president has killed off almost half a million of his citizens and displaced more than eight million people who now languish in squalid camps? Has Smith, or anyone for that matter, called for a downgrading or breaking of relations with that genocidal country?

She also has a lot of criticism for Israel rescuing thousands of Ethiopian Jews. What other country has done anything that can compare to saving the lives of thousands of destitute Africans? Name just one, Ms Smith.

In the same paragraph, the Zionist “trope” creeps into her narrative and don’t we all know what she means when using that word!