OWN CORRESPONDENT
She will be in South Africa until this coming Monday. Khaled arrived at OR Tambo last Friday to a hero’s welcome, with ANC dignitaries – including ministers – prominent. Even Ronnie Kasrils vied for some of the action.
With all eyes this week on President Jacob Zuma’s State of the Nation address, Khaled received a special invitation to the event.
BDS-SA said in a media release: “The Palestinian freedom fighter and icon, Leila Khaled, will be attending the upcoming State of the Nation Address (Sona) delivered by President Jacob Zuma as a guest of the Presiding Officers.”
It added: “Leila Khaled’s presence at Sona should be seen as a clear sign that South Africa is a friend of Palestine and that no pro-Israeli lobby or interest group can change this fact.”
To recapture Khaled’s “glory” of her 60s firebrand years, is the BDS-SA invitation to announce her visit, showing a young Khaled defiantly brandishing an AK-47. But Khaled – now in her 70s – is so much “yesterday’s terrorist, say some observers; what she has to offer to the complex Mideast problem, is anybody’s guess.
The South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) who have been vocal in its rejection of Khaled’s visit, have organised a demonstration against it on Friday February 13, at 6 Spin Street, Cape Town CBD at 08:30. Permission has been granted for 100 protesters.
In a media release, Mary Kluk, chairman of the SAJBD, refuted claims that the BDS is “non-violent” and that Khaled and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) “are peace loving”.
“We reject BDS’ attempts to import terrorism to South Africa; we reject BDS’ attempts to glorifying terrorism, especially now, when global terrorism poses the greatest threat to freedom and peace the world over; we reject BDS’ attempts to glorify violence (best expressed by their use of Khaled lovingly wielding an AK-47 as their poster picture); following on from that, we reject the BDS claim that they stand for non-violence. Rather, we believe that by hosting Khaled (over and above many other possible spokespeople who believe in negotiations and peaceful co-existence between Israelis and Palestinians), BDS is sending a clear message to our country of what they stand for.”
The SAJBD in its release explained that “the PFLP is a proscribed (banned) terror organisation in the US, the EU and Canada. It has been responsible for decades of terror activities.”
Khaled was refused entry to the UK for her terrorist activities. She has repeatedly said that she rejects negotiations and prefers violence. In 1972 in 972 magazine, she wrote: “Resistance doesn’t only happen through violence but violence is the mainstream.”
In a newspaper interview in Johannesburg last week she said: “I am in the politburo of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), responsible for refugees and the right of return, and this means I have to work on spreading and promoting the culture of the right of return.
“Ask any Palestinian: ‘What’s your dream?’ And they will say: ‘To go back’,” says Khaled who herself lives in Jordan.
She decried the lack of official support from Arab regimes for an independent Palestine. “They just don’t say it verbally, but practically, it’s only the masses who support the freedom of Palestinians.”
Khaled, who confirmed that she was still a Marxist, said the PLO, which is part of the PFLP, “calls for achieving the rights of Palestinans even by armed struggle”.
BDS-SA this week in a media release said Khaled “has had a wonderful South African trip thus far, with huge support from the liberation movement and ruling party, the ANC as well as from the thousands of supporters across the country…
“South African leaders have not succumbed to pro-Israeli groups that have tried to influence leaders into rejecting comrade Leila Khaled.”
