SA’S Palestinian solidarity must be ‘backed by uncompromising action’
FOLLOWING what is usually a routine, even boring and mostly ignored, event – the acceptance by the South African president of letters of credence from foreign ambassadors – the past two weeks witnessed a flurry of criticism, explanations, condemnations and defences.
Immediately after the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (Dirco) and the Presidency tweeted pictures of a smiling President Cyril Ramaphosa with a smiling new Israeli ambassador, Eliav Belotsecovsky, Palestine solidarity activists responded angrily, slamming the president, the government and the ANC, accusing them of hypocrisy and of betraying the Palestinian people.
Uncharacteristically, Dirco responded immediately on social media, attempting to reassure South Africans that government remained pro-palestinian. That sparked more and harsher condemnations.
Dirco responded with a rambling defensive statement asserting: “The situation is dynamic, and South Africa will ensure that its diplomatic presence is strategic and geared towards ending the occupation.”
Stronger condemnation followed, from activists, some opposition political parties and politicians, who demanded that South Africa terminate diplomatic relations with the state that many human rights organisations (including, most recently, Amnesty International) have labelled an apartheid state, a designation also used by the South African Human Sciences Research Council.
Israeli apologists in South Africa, a little late to the party, claimed to be “encouraged by the government’s acceptance of the credentials of (the) Israeli ambassador” and viewed it as “a practical and positive step forward in increasing ties between the governments of SA and Israel”, in the words of the national chairperson of the South African Zionist Federation, Rowan Polovin.
He did, however, accuse some in the ANC of “us(ing) and abus(ing) the Israel issue for their domestic political agendas”, thus, it seems, agreeing with many Palestine solidarity activists that the ruling party was inconsistent and hypocritical.
It is fair to ask, however, whether Ramaphosa’s accepting the Israeli letter of credence really is hypocrisy, or, as Polovin calls it, a “paradigm shift”.
Presenting the matter in these ways serves the agendas of those articulating the positions, but does it reflect the reality? The solidarity activists want to use this to pressure the government to end diplomatic links with Israel; the Israel apologists want to pressure the government to “clearly indicate its support for Israel and acknowledge its place as the only democracy in the Middle East,” according to Polovin. But the government will accede to neither demand.
Far from being a “paradigm shift”,
South Africa’s president accepting the credentials of an Israeli ambassador has been the practice of all South African presidents in the democratic era; there is nothing special about the fact that Ramaphosa did this (nor that he smiled broadly at the ambassador of an apartheid state). Many within the Palestine solidarity movement argue that South Africa should end all relations, including diplomatic, with Israel. The government, and the ruling party, have – rightly or wrongly – taken the view that they will incrementally
reduce South Africa’s diplomatic representation in Israel but will not force the Israelis to reciprocate.
Of course, the government and the ANC can do much more to give credence to its claimed support of the Palestinian people, such as granting them visas on arrival (as with Israelis), scholarships for Palestinian students, and, generally, giving Palestinians the kind of benefits that states supporting the South African anti-apartheid Struggle gave to black South Africans. But inadequacy is a far cry from hypocrisy.
And, of course, South Africa should not again go down the road of wanting to “mediate” between Palestinians and Israelis. That has been tried and is used as a stick by the Israel lobby to muzzle South Africa’s criticism of Israeli crimes. South Africa is pro-palestinian and should continue to support Palestinians domestically and abroad, including vigorously opposing Israel’s human rights violations, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
But it needs to be stated that South Africa has, incrementally since the mid-2010s, weakened its relations with Israel. Around 2014, Palestine solidarity activists campaigned against the practice of ANC Youth League leaders, municipal police and other government officials visiting Israel for “training” and on “fact-finding missions”.
Ebrahim Ebrahim, then deputy minister of international relations and head of the ANC’S International Relations Committee, said at the time: “Israel is an occupier country which is oppressing Palestine, so it is not proper for South Africans to associate with Israel. We discourage people from going there except if it has to do with the peace process”. Thus, began a rapid slowing down of l relations between the two states.
The decision at the ANC’S 2017 conference, at which guests included representatives of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation and Hamas, to downgrade South Africa’s representation in Tel Aviv was a significant “paradigm shift”. Though many observers believed the government would ignore the resolution, as it does with many ANC resolutions, the next year saw South Africa’s ambassador to Tel Aviv recalled in protest against the Israeli massacre of demonstrators in Gaza during the “Great March of Return”.
South Africa has resolved not to send another ambassador to Israel, effectively downgrading its representation. Discussions are ongoing in Dirco about how to give further effect to the 2017 ANC resolution.
In Africa, South Africa remains one of the strongest supporters of the Palestinian people and their struggle for liberation.
This was borne out by South Africa’s active campaigning for a boycott of the 2017 “Africa-israel Summit”, which was subsequently cancelled. And, since July last year, South Africa – with Algeria – have led the campaign against Israel’s accreditation to the AU.
South Africa is also at the forefront, following the various designations of Israel’s apartheid practices and based on the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid, of campaigning for that apartheid label to be applied in multilateral fora such as the UN.
Numerous countries of the global south, in particular, are looking for South African leadership on the issue, and we dare not waiver in efforts to ensure Israel is declared an apartheid state in the UN and made into a pariah, as apartheid South Africa was.
None of this deserves any great praise. The South African government, especially Minister Naledi Pandor and President Ramaphosa, are simply giving effect to our constitutional values and the values and principles of various foreign policy position papers.
A regular and valid criticism by solidarity activists is that while South Africa has strong and principled positions on the Palestinian issue in multilateral forums, it does not translate that domestically with policies supporting boycotts, divestments and sanctions, by ensuring that state-owned enterprises do not use products and services from Israel, and by supporting workers – such as Clover workers most recently – in their battles against Israeli-owned companies in South Africa.
But it does mean, first, that South Africa’s solidarity with the Palestinian people is more than what might be reflected in a picture with a smiling apartheid ambassador and post-apartheid president. And second, no matter how Israeli apologists want to trap South Africa into a “mediator” role and thus blunt its action against Israel, that ship has sailed.
The South African government and the ruling party have placed themselves firmly in the Palestinian camp, and their action on the global stage must reflect that uncompromisingly.