Cii News | 24 December 2012
Palestinian solidarity groupings have welcomed the “historic and decisive resolutions” on Palestine adopted by the African National Congress (ANC) at its 53rd National Conference which concluded last week.
The South African ruling party re-affirmed the call by its international solidarity conference in October to endorse the call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel.
The resolution was a response to sustained lobbying from Palestinian solidarity quarters as well as the 2005 Palestinian civil society call to the international community for a program and campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) to be applied against Israel as a way to pressure Israel to end its violations of international law and respect Palestinian human rights.
Congratulating the ANC for its decision, Coalition for a Free Palestine(CFP) spokesperson Tahir Sema told Cii News the significance of the move should not be underestimated. “This is the largest single endorsement the BDS campaign has received since its inception.”
In a further commendable step, the ANC also called for all South Africans to “support the programmes and campaigns of Palestinian civil society which seek to put pressure on Israel to engage with the Palestinian people to reach a just solution.”
Yet another conference resolution articulated the ANC’s abhorrence the of the recent Israeli “state-sponsored xenophobic attacks and deportation” of African migrants and requested that this matter should be escalated to the African Union.
Africa’s oldest liberation movement also asserted that there could be no moral equivalence between oppressor and oppressed, firmly locating its sympathies with the Palestinians. “The ANC is unequivocal in its support for the Palestinian people in their struggle for self-determination, and unapologetic in its view that the Palestinians are the victims and the oppressed in the conflict with Israel.”
In a statement, the Coalition, South Africa’s largest Palestine solidarity umbrella body said it was looking forward to working with the ANC and the International Solidarity Conference (ISC) steering committee on the implementation of the resolutions. “The groundbreaking nature of the resolutions adopted at the governing party’s National Conference, show that South Africa remains committed to ending apartheid in Israel.”
It further congratulated the ANC on a “highly successful” 53rd National Conference in which it said democracy, robust debate and the adoption of important resolutions were achieved.
Earlier in the week, the Mangaung conference was addressed by Fatah senior Deputy Foreign Relations Commissioner, Dr Abdullah Abdullah, who called on the ANC and the people of South Africa to support and advance the boycott of Israel. “The [international arm of the] South African struggle begun with the boycott campaign of South African grapes and wine, likewise the illegal Israeli settlements can be defeated by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) [against Israel campaign],” he reportedly told the conference where he received “overwhelming praise and applause.”
There has been no official reaction to the resolutions from leading South African Zionist organisations yet. However, chiding Jewish community leaders for a weak counter-response, popular community news portal MyShtetl reported the move as confirmation of its earlier premonition that the ANC was outsourcing its Middle East policy to the BDS Movement.