In a time that the ANC is increasingly acting aggressively towards Israel, especially the department of Trade and Industry’s forced re-classification of products from occupied territories, it now appears that the DA is siding with the ANC against Israel and find themselves wholeheartedly on the side of the Palestinian people in their struggle against Israel, Adv. Anton Alberts, the FF Plus’ parliamentary spokesperson on Trade and Industry said.
According to an article in the Business Day Live (17 February 2014), a delegation of the DA turned its back on Israel in a parliamentary conference earlier this month and sided with the anti-Israeli sentiments of the ANC. During the conference, with the objective of showing solidarity with the Palestinian people, Western Sahara and Cuba, various anti-Israeli resolutions were adopted, while the DA’s parliamentary delegation did not oppose it and did not speak out against it.
In November last year, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, South Africa’s minister of International Relations made comments that were so upsetting that the former Israeli minister of foreign affairs, Avigdor Lieberman, warned all Jewish people to leave South Africa for their own safety. Nkoana-Mashabane had, according to media reports at the time, told trade unions that the government’s official policy is to have no relations with Israel on a ministerial level until progress has been made with the peace process with the Palestinian people and until their problems have been resolved.
She also said that the Palestinian struggle is also a South African struggle.
It now appears that the DA has put its weight behind the ANC regarding the country’s official policy on Israel. According to Adv. Alberts, it is only a small step from being merely anti-Jewish to a campaign in which the Jewish minority in South Africa, with the approval of the DA, is also targeted.
“The comments of Nkoana-Mashabane that no senior government representative may visit Israel officially effectively boil downs to sanctions against Israel.
“The FF Plus supports a two-state solution and a cessation of all violence between Israel and the Palestinian people. This includes self-determination for the Palestinian people and the independence of Israel.
“The DA will have to explain to the Jewish community what their real views are on Israel. It appears that this is now the fourth sudden policy about-turn of the DA following their somersaults on racist economic transformation and the land issue. Minorities will have to take note of this as the real opposition no longer lies with the DA,” Adv. Alberts says.
Some of the resolutions which had been accepted and which the DA did not object to, includes full military, economic and political sanctions against Israel, the creation of special courts to put Israeli citizens and South Africans who serve in the Israeli military on trial for war crimes and stopping all financial transactions with Israeli businesses.
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