The SA government has doubled down on its dreadful foreign policy, supporting Hamas and even discussing sending aid to the terrorist organisation. What else should we expect from a government that supports Russia during its war of conquest against Ukraine?
While the ANC denies offering military support, should it really be having any sort of friendly discussion with an internationally proscribed, terrorist group? There are plenty of intermediaries and aid groups SA could be working through to ensure humanitarian aid gets through to innocent civilians — without working hand-in-hand with a hate group responsible for perpetrating the single most violent day against Jewish people since the Holocaust.
The government — more accurately, the ANC — has a long history of supporting Palestine through thick and thin, despite Hamas having launched countless rocket strikes on civilians for well over a decade, and it is the primary party responsible for irrefutably refusing any sort of peaceful resolution to the conflict.
In September the SA government exempted those with Palestinian passports from needing visas to visit SA. The Palestinian foreign affairs minister and expatriates welcomed the move, viewing it as a message of solidarity.
In practice, this unmonitored and unregulated travel will allow Hamas to use SA as a part of its terrorist infrastructure, allowing its operatives to travel here to gather resources, intelligence, and perhaps even to undertake operations against Jewish civilians here.
Staging ground
We should not be making it easier for terrorists to use our country as a staging ground to enact their war of hate. The move will also lead to SA remaining on the Financial Action Task Force’s greylist, ensuring that we continue to scare away investors while eroding global confidence in our economy.
Sadly, the ANC already knows all of this and simply doesn’t care. The party’s deputy secretary-general, Nomvula Mokonyane, condemned Israel during a march on its embassy: “Down with the Israeli government, down. Down with the killing of people and the bombing of hospitals, down. The Israeli embassy must leave SA. The embassy must close and the ambassador must go. Boycott Israeli products.”
No such statements have been made in any way to condemn the rape, murder, torture and abduction of Israelis. Where are the protests against Hamas? Where is the rightful condemnation?
SA is unfortunately a deeply hate-filled and anti-Semitic country. Even when Israel is not conducting air strikes on Gaza, pro-Palestine supporters spread their hate through the streets and at our universities, all the while intimidating innocent people.
Five months ago pro-Palestine supporters harassed and intimidated Jewish people at synagogues, kosher restaurants and even the Cape Town Holocaust & Genocide Centre. School groups were among those harassed. Hateful slurs and threats were flung at innocent people just trying to live their lives.
Pagad, a violent vigilante and extremist group, issued statements calling Israel supporters satanists and claimed there is a Zionist network growing in SA in an attempt to take over the country. It accused the Western Cape government of harbouring criminals (Jews), and threatened to take matters into its own hands.
Sea Point in Cape Town is targeted by pro-Palestine supporters who stage hate rallies in the area because they perceive it as being owned by Jewish people, a myth that is in itself anti-Semitic and illustrates the hate-filled ignorance of these groups.
No justification
The ANC should realise that the apparent apartheid of Israel is in no way related to the apartheid it fought against in SA. It should recognise that there is no justification for rape, or the torture and murder of civilians. It should also realise that there is a huge difference between the direct and brutal killing of civilians and the deaths of civilians who refuse to leave areas Hamas is using to target Israel with rockets.
I am not optimistic that the ANC will have any common sense. It is content to back terrorists in a war of hatred, while allowing the harassment of its own people by hate groups masquerading as liberation organisations.
All we can hope for is that more and more South Africans will grow wise to the ignorance, malice and ludicrousness of the pro-Palestinian cause and recognise Israel’s democracy, freedom and right to defend itself and seek justice for the crimes perpetrated against it.
If you still condemn Israel after all of this I ask you a simple question: what should Israel have done after October 7? I have yet to hear a single reasonable response.
• Woode-Smith is a political analyst, economic historian and author based in Cape Town.
