Pandor’s pandering to Hamas aligns SA with terrorists

“Beware, South Africa,” warned the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) on 17 October, in one of the most stark statements it has ever made. “According to Hamas, Minister [Dr Naledi] Pandor expressed support for its surprise attack on Israel in which Hamas targeted civilians and took hostages. Minister Pandor has engaged with an Islamic Jihadist organisation and in so doing, has dragged our country into very dangerous waters.”

For this, South African Jewish leaders are calling for her to be fired.

“For the sake of South Africa’s credibility on the international stage, we would think that was the only possible option,” said SAJBD National Director Wendy Kahn.

At first Pandor, South Africa’s minister of international relations and cooperation (Dirco), her department, and Presidential Spokesperson Vincent Magwenya denied that she had spoken to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. Then they admitted that she had. And though an official statement from Hamas said she had expressed support for the 7 October massacre, Pandor insisted the discussion was only about South Africa sending aid to the Palestinians.

“There has been a massive flurry in diplomatic circles in South Africa and around the world, as diplomats across the board have expressed their shock that Pandor engaged with Hamas,” Kahn says. “Pandor needs to be held accountable.”

“It’s a disgrace to learn that Pandor phoned Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and pledged South Africa’s support to his antisemitic terrorist cult that recently murdered more than 1 400 Jews in cold blood, injured thousands, and abducted hundreds,” said South African Zionist Federation (SAZF) National Chairperson Rowan Polovin.

“No amount of backpedalling by the South African government can undo the shame that Pandor’s extremist antics have brought upon South Africa,” he said. “The SAZF calls on Pandor to resign immediately, and apologise to the South African Jewish community for the hurt and shame she has caused.

“South Africa is one of the few countries to confirm publicly that it has had talks with Hamas since the war began,” reported BBC News Africa after Pandor admitted it. News24 reported that “top diplomats wouldn’t speak on the record, but more than one expressed disquiet at direct state-to-state communications between South Africa and Hamas, and predicted it would complicate South Africa’s relationship with the likes of the United States”.

The Institute of Race Relations’ (IRR) Sara Gon notes that Pandor trying to explain away her conversation about providing aid “is a form of virtue signalling, because Pandor knows that the unfolding disaster is the fault of the very Hamas that she and her government support”.

Pandor’s conversation with the Hamas leader follows her department’s weak and uninformed response to the 7 October massacre. While world leaders and governments condemned Hamas’ atrocities throughout the day on 7 October, it took South Africa’s Dirco until late that evening to release a statement, which made no mention of the atrocities that had taken place.

Then, on 15 October, in a speech at the III International Dilemmas of Humanity Conference, Pandor didn’t acknowledge anything that had happened in Israel just more than a week earlier. Instead, she focused on how she was “horrified when in 2021, the African Union issued an invitation to Israel to become an AU observer.” Totally ignoring Hamas’ atrocities, she went on to criticise Israel.

On 17 October, speaking on 702, she described Israel’s existence as the problem. Though she expressed condolences to Israel for the loss of civilians and the abduction of hostages, she justified the Hamas massacre, saying, “We recognise the desperation that leads to actions of this nature. I don’t know whether we can condemn it [the Hamas atrocities]. I don’t have sufficient information on who the responsible parties are,” she said.

She also said there was “deafening silence on the part of the Jewish Board of Deputies on the Palestinian question” and “to them, Palestinians don’t exist”. She then falsely stated that “Israel is preventing any aid from getting through, and is actually attacking humanitarian aid transport.”

Gon said Pandor’s conversation with Hamas meant that “Western governments will note it, adding it to Lady R and Agoa as reasons why South Africa isn’t fit for investment.”

Even before Pandor’s Hamas call, the IRR warned that the South African government and the ruling party weren’t acting in South Africa’s best interest by siding with Hamas.

“The shameful silence on the atrocities committed by Hamas is tantamount to an endorsement of this barbaric atrocity, which has, perhaps not unreasonably, been described as a pogrom,” said the IRR in a statement.

“The implications of the ANC’s support for Hamas extend beyond the Middle East. By embracing Hamas, the ANC has aligned itself ideologically with similar Islamist terror movements across Africa which are inspired by the same worldview as Hamas. These movements are responsible for numerous atrocities in Africa, ranging from the burning of African churches to the murder of many African Christians,” the statement read.

“The decision to back Hamas is also likely to harm South Africa’s direct interests. For example, having just expended great diplomatic effort to repair its diplomatic relationship with the United States, the South African government’s effective siding with Hamas threatens to break it all down again. South Africans must now expect the United States to exercise closer scrutiny of South Africa’s trade ties and financial flows and anticipate the risk, which had seemingly just been averted, of Agoa being cancelled.

“Any person or group that has played a role in hosting, funding, endorsing, or advocating for Hamas – designated a ‘foreign terrorist organisation’ by the United States department of state – stands to be investigated at a global level regarding its terrorism ties,” the statement read. “In South Africa, this could include financial institutions that facilitated payments to Hamas, religious and public organisations, and political parties.”

The statement said the IRR would write to President Cyril Ramaphosa, asking him to explain what impact the South African government’s support for Hamas would have on South Africa’s greylisting and trade relationships; what tangible benefits, if any, South Africa derives from associating with Hamas; what tangible benefits Hamas has delivered for the Palestinians in Gaza; and whether the government would be willing to defend South Africans against radical Islamic terrorism.

Meanwhile, local news outlet the Media Review Network (MRN) expressed support for Pandor’s call to Hamas. In a press statement, MRN executive member Dr Ahmed Haroon Jazbhay said, “Pretoria has shown leadership by reaching out to Hamas. South Africa has an interest in backing the resistance against Zionist settler colonialism and apartheid, and this mustn’t be allowed to be undermined by local Zionist organisations and their lackeys in the political sphere.

“While Dirco has claimed that this diplomatic engagement was merely about assisting in getting humanitarian aid to the besieged Palestinians in Gaza, we at MRN strongly believe it has the potential to be further developed,” said Jazbhay. “This must be the first step in legitimising Hamas as a representative of Palestinian aspirations for liberation from Zionist settler colonialism and for a sovereign state from the river to the sea.”