Feizel Mamdoo
The signatories to the statement that condemns Israel’s bombing of Palestinians in Gaza, include some of South Africa’s finest citizens, recognised and well-respected leaders in a range of fields.
Very many of the signatories are known to South Africans far and wide, as having been in the forefront of the struggle for democracy in South Africa. They suffered detention, imprisonment, banning – and vilification by fellow white South Africans – for their principled commitment to justice and human rights.
The stand of these South Africans now against the actions of the Israeli state, is entirely consistent with their stand then against the apartheid state. It is a stand against dispossession and colonial oppression; against racial, ethnic and religious exclusivism; against injustice and discrimination; against violence and repression.
Far from being “Jew haters” and the “long lost relatives” of Jews who “worked for the Nazis”, the signatories to the statement are principled democratic and freedom loving people, the conscience of your “responders” now as they were of white South Africa during apartheid.
Johannesburg
