Boesak says SA action against Zionist state ‘not enough 

Anti-apartheid activist, Dr Allan Boesak says that while South Africans are thankful for the cabinet to withdraw the country’s diplomats from Israel, it does not go far enough – he called for the shutdown of the Israeli Embassy similar to what Bolivia had done.

In a media statement, he said: “It is now indisputably clear that the war against the Palestinians is in fact a war of extermination, and that even Israeli officials have in so many words repeatedly said so.

“The indiscriminate, mind-numbing ferocity of the bombing of Gaza in general, and the targeted bombing of refugee camps, schools, shelters, mosques, churches, of convoys fleeing to safety upon instructions of Israel, of ambulances, to say nothing of the turning off water and electricity is not only collective punishment beyond any imagination but are war crimes of deliberate intent.

“The numbers of innocent civilians slaughtered, including now over 3,000 children, are likewise with deliberate intent. According to Save the Children, Israel has now killed more children in four weeks than the total number of children killed in wars across the world since 2019.

“In light of the ongoing Nakba since 1948, the uninterrupted occupation, the growing settler-colonialist project driven by Israel and supported militarily, financially, and politically by especially the United States of America and its allies in the UK and Western Europe, the unrelenting siege of Gaza and the continuing acts of land theft, the response of Palestinians has the character of a slave revolt, for which Black South Africans should have the fullest understanding.

“All over the world, especially in those countries most guilty of complicity in this present genocide, ordinary citizens have been gathering in the millions to demand an end to these atrocities.

South Africans, in call after call, have been specific in their demands to this government:

·  Shut down the Israeli embassy.

·  Recall our diplomatic staff from Israel.

·  Officially declare Israel an Apartheid State

· Break all ties with the Israeli Apartheid State and support the call for Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions

“Only one demand has been responded to, thus far. The rest resolutely still stands. Now is not the time for delay. Neither is it the time for South Africa’s people to step back as if now the situation is normal. This tepid response of the ANC government does not reflect the seriousness of the crisis of life and death In Palestine, the crisis of conscience for us, nor the will of the people. Timidity and incrementalism are not the way in which South Africa should respond to the cold-blooded murder of the innocents”, he added.