It's Almost Supernatural

Xenophobic Attacks

Two ugly xenophobic incidents over the last week, in both my physical and spiritual homelands.

Israel: 8 Jews arrested for assault on Arabs

Eight youths from Jerusalem were arrested Tuesday on suspicion they assaulted and stabbed two Israeli Arabs, residents of the Shuafat refugee camp, Army Radio reported. The assault occurred on the eve of Memorial Day for Israel's Fallen Soldiers and Victims of Terrorism near the entrance to the Pisgat Ze'ev shopping mall. One of the victims sustained moderate wounds and his friend did not require any medical care. Advertisement According to Army Radio, the eight suspects said during police questioning that the assault was part of efforts to rid the Pisgat Ze'ev neighborhood of Arabs. The suspects said the neighborhood had been overrun by Arabs who were harassing Jewish girls and causing a ruckus.

South Africa: Xenophobia – 22 face charges

Johannesburg - A man was shot dead and another injured when violence flared up in Alexandra on Monday evening, bringing the death toll in suspected xenophobic attacks to three, police said on Tuesday. Constable Neria Malefetse said a total of 39 people were arrested in the Johannesburg township on Monday evening. "A man was shot and killed and one was injured," she said, adding that both victims were South African. Another two people were killed on Sunday night - one of them also South African - and dozens were injured when an angry mob took to the streets and targeted foreigners who residents say are not welcome here. Malefetse said although the violence was aimed at foreigners, two of the three people killed since Sunday were South Africans.

The incident involving the South African violence is far more severe and symptomatic of persistent xenophobia directed at foreigners within South Africa. But which incident is more likely to be used as an example to tarnish and delegitimize the sovereignty of a nation state?

These foreigners, mostly Zimbabweans, were assualted in Alexandra in xenophobic violence. These photos from news24, show some of the injured that were taken to the local clinic and others who fled their homes looking for shelter at the Bramley police station.

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Calls for Gordimer to Boycott Israel Continue

I’m beginning to think that Nadine Gordimer has some spooky powers that we don’t quite understand. How else do you explain the ridiculous campaign of activists, armed pen-in-hand, ready to sign onto any petition calling for the South African authoress to boycott the International Writers Festival to be held in Jerusalem later this year?

For the second (or is it third) week running the absolutely besotted-with-the-Palestinians folks at the Mail & Guardian have again published calls for Gordimer to boycott the festival in Jerusalem. This week they lead with an article directed at Gordimer entitled “Rethink your Israel visit.” They mention that “a number of prominent South Africans” have also asked her to reconsider.

The History and Current Affairs Society at the University of Cape Town has also added their names to the narcissistic cries. One prominent name on the letter (an ex-UCT student) is that of a former leader of Habonim SA – Doron Isaacs.

It seems clear to me that people like Doron Isaacs are not calling for dialogue or engagement as they often claim; they are calling for the absolute delegitimisation and demonization of Israel so as to pave the way for a total Palestinian victory.

The History and Current Affairs society indicates that the Writers Festival will include a discussion on “The Writer’s Role in a Time of Crisis.” This is an anathema to the anti-Israel lobbyists. Their vain attempts to liken Israel to apartheid South Africa rot away when they consider whether South Africa would have ever allowed such a discussion to take place on our soil in the midst of apartheid. They know full well that there will be a multitude of views and opinions expressed – views and opinions that Zionists would find offensive and repulsive – yet these views will be aired openly without any fear in the capital of the state that they will be criticising. And this is what our UCT society members want to avoid – they are trying to remove legitimacy from where it can never be taken.

It’s a pity, but it looks as if the pursuit of self aggrandisement trumps the pursuit of real political progress.

To be honest, I don't really mind or care what Gordimer thinks of Israel. I encourage her participation, but her go/no-go decision carries no supernatural power of legitimacy.

Previously at IAS

• Gordimer resists Israel boycott

Not Everyone is Celebrating Israel’s 60th

The South African Communist Party (SACP), a member of the ANC’s tripartheid governing alliance, has issued a disgusting response to an invitation by Israeli Ambassador to South Africa Ilan Baruch to Israel’s 60th birthday celebrations. If there was ever any doubt about their feelings towards the Jewish state, this letter in which Israel is denounced as an Apartheid state guilty of genocide, surely erases them.

Inviting the SACP to Israel’s official 60th birthday celebrations was a stupid move on the part of the embassy. It would be the equivalent of inviting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to attend the Holocaust memorial ceremony at Auschwitz. Sure as a principle it’s important to reach out to your enemies but one also has so be practical, particularly when a rejection would provide them with another opportunity to slate you.

That they would refuse to attend should come as no surprise. But what is shocking is the viciousness of the SACP’s response. The SACP attributes to Israel every war crime imaginable from ‘murder, torture, banishment of millions of Palestinian refugees, settlements expansion and the creation of tiny Palestinian Bantustans prisons’ and blames the Jewish state for pursuing ‘racists, oppressive and genocidal (my emphasis) policies and practices towards the Palestinians in defiance of UN resolutions and international law’. Moreover Israel’s commitment to peace is questioned and it is accused of being an outpost of US imperialism with the objective of bringing ‘more wars, militarism, violence, torture and anti-democratic repression’ to the Middle East. This is a particularly laughable charge given that by all objective standards Israel is rated as the most free and democratic state in its region.

But the worst part of the SACP letter is its proposed solution to the Israeli-Arab conflict. The SACP supports ‘the right of Palestinians to self determination and the creation of an independent sovereign state within the pre 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital, including the right of return of all the Palestinian refugees.’ Supporting the creation of a Palestinian state not only in the West Bank and Gaza but in Israel proper (the ‘right’ of return) is a blatant call for the destruction of Israel.

Now if these were the rantings of a marginal party whose failed ideology had been discarded onto the South African political rubbish bin, it would be of little concern. But this is not the case. Not only is the SACP an alliance partner with the ANC in government but it is also an important power broker within the ANC. Together with COSATU their support was instrumental in getting Jacob Zuma elected as the new president of the ANC. Post-Polokwane, they have increased positions of importance in both the ANC National Executive Committee and National Working Committee lists. Their spokesperson, Jeremy Cronin is number 5 on the NEC list and his boss, Blade Nzimande is number 11. Thus there is a very real risk that in the years ahead their extreme positions could become official government policy in South Africa.

But it will not stop there. As they put it ‘we will work with all peace loving Israelis and the South African Jewish community and conscientious objectors in Israel to coordinate actions of solidarity for the Palestinians and to defeat the racist apartheid ideology of Zionism.’ If they get their way, once again South African Jewry might be forced to make a choice between their support for Israel and their comfortable lives in South Africa. This is something we must nip in the bud now. It is crucial SA Jewish leadership respond with a clear statement that we will never support such a policy and will always continue to support Zionism and its dream of a free Jewish state in our ancient homeland at peace with its neighbours.

Full letter: Open Rejection of Invitation from Israeli ambassador

Yom Ha'atzmaut Celebration

I just received this message about the Yom Ha'atzmaut celebrations tonight.

A notice has been placed on Facebook stating that the Yom Ha'atzmaut celebrations due to take place tomorrow night have been postponed. This message, which is false, has been posted by a person or persons unknown to the SA Zionist Federation. Please note that the Yom Ha'atzmaut Celebrations will take place as planned this evening, Wednesday 7 May, from 17h00. There is NO CHANGE in the date, the venue or the time.

Durban 2 Won’t Be in SA

In what represents a small victory for SA Jewry South Africa has been announced that it will not host the follow up to the UN World Conference Against Racism, which was held in Durban in 2001.

The conference held in Durban in 2001 was widely condemned for descending into a pit of unrepentant anti-Semitism after the objectives were hijacked by various Israel/Jew loathing pressure groups. According to Tony Leon, the conference also cost South African taxpayers a whopping R100 million.

Writing in the Star, columnist Peter Fabricius examines possible reasons for the abandonment of the plans to host the event. Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Ronnie Mamoepa is on record as saying that SA never offered to host the event in the first place. But back in February this year however, we reported that in his State of the Nation address President Mbeki stated ‘Next year, SA will play host to the Review Conference to evaluate the implementation of the decisions of the World Conference Against Racism.’

Fabricius thinks that the lobbying by the SA Jewish Board of Deputies was instrumental in convincing SA that Durban 1 aggravated tensions between Jewish and Muslim communities in SA and that a repetition should be avoided.

Why did SA change its mind? Wendy Kahn, national director of the SA Jewish Board of Deputies, which lobbied the SA government strongly against hosting Durban II, is ‘absolutely delighted’ that it has decided not to, but is not quite sure why. Possibly SA felt that hosting a racism conference in Africa again would have suggested that racism is largely an African issue whereas it felt that the focus should now be shifted to racism in Europe. Or maybe Pretoria agreed with UN Watch and others that it would be better to hold the review conference within secure UN premises to try and prevent the kind of ugly and highly publicised demonstrations that marred Durban 2001 – especially a year before 2010.

Hopefully the new venue will be better equipped than SA was in 2001 to prevent the naked hate-fest that the previous conference turned into.

One of the many hateful posters on display at the World Conference against Racism in Durban in 2001.