mods, apologies for ot, if too deviating, request to move to appropriate thread
Haresh wrote: ↑13 Jan 2024 02:55
The relationship with the old apartheid SA and Israel was strictly transactional, nothing more. The Iranians under the Shah and the sowdis/gulf nations also traded with them. If my memory is correct I remember reading many years that some Vijayanta tanks were exported whole to SA as scrap.
the only thing that matters in this affair is what the south africans (majority / system), or the ones who are in power at least, think about any perceived wrongs perpetuated against them; listing the below from wiki, the sources are a matter of public record, needless to say, this is not the first rodeo between the 2 nations
In 1994, South Africa held its first democratic elections, and Nelson Mandela was elevated to the presidency. In a speech in August 1993, Mandela had said that his party, the ANC, had been "extremely unhappy" with the apartheid-era Israel–South Africa connection, but was willing to move past it, including in seeking a resolution to the longstanding Israeli–Palestinian conflict:
"As a movement, we recognize the legitimacy of Palestinian nationalism just as we recognize the legitimacy of Zionism as a Jewish nationalism... We insist on the right of the state of Israel to exist within secure borders, but with equal vigor, support the Palestinian right to national self-determination."[134]
He (Mandela) finally visited Israel in October 1999, during a tour of the Levant. He reiterated his unwavering opposition to Israeli control of Gaza, the West Bank, Golan Heights, and Southern Lebanon,[139] but also said:
"To the many people who have questioned why I came, I say: Israel worked very closely with the apartheid regime. I say: I've made peace with many men who slaughtered our people like animals. Israel cooperated with the apartheid regime, but it did not participate in any atrocities."[140]
[in 2004] This followed a particularly tense phase in relations: earlier that year, the South African government had criticised Israel's construction of the Israeli West Bank barrier,[141] and an official delegation led by Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad had made representations in support of the Palestinian case at the International Court of Justice.[143]
In 2008 a delegation of African National Congress (ANC) veterans visited Israel and the Occupied Territories, and said that in some respects it was worse than apartheid.[156][157] In May 2018, in the aftermath of the Gaza border protests, the ANC issued a statement comparing the actions of Palestinians to "our struggle against the apartheid regime". It also accused the Israeli military of "the same cruelty" as Hitler, and stated that "all South Africans must rise up and treat Israel like the pariah that it is".[158] Around the same time, the South African government withdrew indefinitely its Ambassador to Israel, Sisa Ngombane, to protest "the indiscriminate and grave manner of the latest Israeli attack".[159]
Following the 2010 Gaza flotilla raid, South Africa recalled its ambassador from Israel,[161] and summoned the Israeli ambassador for a reprimand.[162] In 2013, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, the South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, said that South Africa had not been sending its ministers to Israel, having decided "to slow down and curtail senior leadership contact with that regime until things begin to look better".[162] Later that year, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cancelled his planned trip to South Africa for Mandela's funeral.[163]
In April 2015, Israel denied South African Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande and his aides permission to visit the Palestinian government in Ramallah, provoking an angry response from Nzimande.[164] And, later that year, the governing ANC in South Africa angered Israel by hosting a delegation from militant Palestinian nationalist group Hamas, which met with South African President Jacob Zuma – though in his capacity as ANC party leader – and signed a memorandum of understanding with the ANC about ending Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories.[165] In response, the Israeli foreign ministry summoned South Africa's deputy ambassador for a reprimand.[166]
An additional contributor to tensions between Israel and South Africa over the past two decades has been high-level political support in South Africa for the pro-Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign. As early as June 2006,[167] the Congress of South African Trade Unions – then the largest union federation in South Africa, and a close partner of the ruling ANC – declared its support for boycotts of Israel, calling the latter an apartheid state.[168]
In September 2011, due to lobbying by Zackie Achmat and his pro-Palestinian Open Shuhuda Street organisation, South African Trade and Industry Minister, Rob Davies, "agreed in principle" that imports manufactured in occupied Palestinian territories should not be labelled as products of Israel, in order to facilitate voluntary boycotts of Israeli goods under BDS.[169] At its 2012 elective conference, the ANC formally resolved to support the BDS campaign.[170] Particularly sensitive has been the academic boycott of Israel by some South African universities.
Following an apparent détente in 2017,[171][172][173] on 14 May 2018, South Africa withdrew its ambassador indefinitely following the 2018 Gaza border protests. In a statement, its Department of International Relations and Cooperation reiterated South Africa's "view that the Israeli Defence Force must withdraw from the Gaza Strip and bring to an end the violent and destructive incursions into Palestinian territories."[174]
In a less restrained statement the following day, the ANC called "on all South Africans to demonstrate to the world that we regard the Israeli government and its armed forces as an outcast and blight on humanity."[175] The ambassador returned to Tel Aviv in September of that year,[176] but, in April 2019, the South African foreign minister, Lindiwe Sisulu, announced that the ambassador would not be replaced when his term ended, and the Tel Aviv embassy would be downgraded to a liaison office.[177][178] This downgrade had earlier been endorsed as the official policy of the ANC by delegates to its December 2017 elective conference.[179][180]
The South African Department of International Relations summarises the prevailing situation as follows:
"There is currently limited political and diplomatic interaction between South Africa and Israel, mainly due to Israel’s antagonistic attitude towards the MEPP [Middle East peace process] and disregard for International Law regarding the rights of the Palestinians and their territories. South Africa’s baseline is that Israel must return to negotiations and create favorable conditions for peaceful negotiations."[18]
