#BDS: Pro-Israel lobby in South Africa outplayed by BDS campaign #fuckIsrael

" The well-organized, well-funded anti-Israel lobby in South Africa, which presses primarily for boycott, disinvestment and sanctions (BDS ) is overpowering the local pro-Israel lobby, a veteran analyst of Israel-South African relations told Haaretz.

"The BDS campaign is very well run and seems to be well-funded. Maybe local Jewish leaders have relied for too long on their relations with ANC leaders who have in case moved on now - such as former president Nelson Mandela - and it's time for the Jewish leadership to do some hard strategizing," said attorney Howard Sackstein, founder and vice-chairman of Jews for Social Justice, the Jewish Anti-Apartheid movement."

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#BDS: Students at South African university boycott #Israel #fuckIsrael

"Students at South Africa’s University of the Witwatersrand say they are adopting an academic and cultural boycott of Israel in solidarity with the Palestinian people.

A statement Monday says the school’s student representative council is calling for an immediate investigation into any academic, financial and cultural relations with Israeli institutions.

The University of Johannesburg last year became the world’s first to impose an academic boycott on Israel, ending its relationship with Ben-Gurion University."

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#BDS: مجلس طلاب جامعة فيتس جنوب أفريقيا يتبنى قرارا يقضي بمقاطعة إسرائيل أكاديمياً و ثقافياً #fuckIsrael

ترحب حملة طلاب فلسطين للمقاطعة الأكاديمية والثقافية لإسرائيل والمنظمات الأهلية الاعضاء بقطاع الشباب بشبكة المنظمات الاهلية بقرار ممثلي مجلس طلاب جامعة فيتس بجنوب افريقيا الذي اتخذ بالإجماع والذي يدعو لمقاطعة المؤسسات الإسرائيلية أكاديميا و ثقافيا. 

وينص  قرار  مجلس طلاب جامعة فيتس علي أن الجامعة لن تشارك في أي تعاون أكاديمي أو ثقافي أو مشاريع مشتركة مع مؤسسات إسرائيلية, كما و أنها لن توفر أي دعم لمؤسسات ثقافية أو أكاديمية إسرائيلية. إضافة إلي ذلك, فان القرار يدعو لاتخاذ إجراءات تحقيقيه بشان أي ارتباطات و علاقات للجامعة مع مؤسسات إسرائيلية سواء كانت أكاديمية, مالية أو ثقافية.

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#BDS: Israeli Officials Accuse South Africa Of Boycotting #Israel

"Commentary | Israeli leaders are seething over the latest call for a boycott of Israel by a ranking member of the South African Government. On Sunday, South Africa’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Ebrahim Ismael Ebrahim, told reporters at the City Press, that he was “discouraging” South Africans from “associating” with Israel. Ebrahim went on to say, “Israel is an occupier country which is oppressing Palestine, so it is not proper for South Africans to associate with Israel. We discourage people from going there except if it has to do with the peace process.”

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#BDS: S.Africa approves 'Made in Palestinian Territories' tags

"South Africa's cabinet on Wednesday said it had approved the placing of Occupied Palestinian Territory labels on imported goods from Jewish settlements.

The trade minister was given the nod to issue a notice requiring that products are marked so that buyers knew their origin was not Israel, spokesman Jimmy Manyi told a press briefing."

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#BDS: طلاب فلسطينيون يطالبون نظراءهم في جنوب افريقيا مقاطعة إسرائيل

وجه شباب وطلاب وممثلو منظمات أهلية شبابية نداء إلى ممثلي مجلس طلاب جامعة فيتس وهي من اكبر جامعات جنوب أفريقيا وتضم أكثر من 27934 طالب/ة لاتخاذ قرار خلال الاجتماع السنوي لاتحاد طلاب الجامعة و الذي يعقد في هذه الأثناء بتبني الدعوات الفلسطينية لمقاطعة إسرائيل وسحب الاستثمارات منها وفرض العقوبات عليها “المعروفة عالميا ب بي دي أس BDS” لإجبار إسرائيل على احترام الاتفاقيات والقوانين الدولية ومبادئ حقوق الإنسان.

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#BDS: #SouthAfrica: Call for Boycott of SA Company Complicit in Israeli Occupation

"Two South African human rights organizations, BDS South Africa and the Palestine Solidarity Alliance, have thrown their weight behind the consumer boycott of a South African company, Karsten Farms, which is complicit in the Israeli Occupation of Palestine.

Karsten Farms sells dates, amongst other produce, under brands such as "Kalahari Medjoul Dates" and have a trade agreement with an Israeli cooperative, Hadiklaim - a company operating, against international law, in the illegal Israeli settlements.

The decision by the two human rights organizations to support the boycott of Karsten Farms only came after first engaging with Karsten Farms, undertaking investigations and consulting relevant stakeholders. (A copy of email correspondence with Karsten Farms can be made available on request)."

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#BDS Video: Cultural Boycott of Israel Takes Hold in South Africa

#BDS: Boycott Israeli goods campaign receives momentum from abroad

"The Palestinian campaign to boycott the Israeli goods made in the illegal settlements of the occupied territories in the West Bank has received a boost from abroad with South Africans and more European states joining the movement.

The “Made in Israel” label has already become a big problem for Israel’s international trade. 

The Palestinians have long called for a boycott of goods made in the illegal Israeli settlements and have even lit bonfires to destroy them."

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#BDS roundup: #SouthAfrica and #Denmark to correctly label Israeli settlement products

"In this week’s roundup of BDS news from around the world, South Africa and Denmark make historic rulings to correctly label Israeli settlement products; and international Quaker churches fully divest from Caterpillar corporation in response to the company’s role in the ongoing illegal demolition of Palestinian homes, land and property.

South Africa and Denmark move to correctly label origin of Israeli settlement products

Both governments of South Africa and Denmark recently ruled that imported products originating from illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank will be labeled as such."

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#BDS: #SouthAfrica mulls BDS sanctions on #Israel

"South Africa is considering imposing economic and cultural sanctions on Israel as part of the worldwide Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign.
The country's Minister of Arts and Culture announced at a conference in Pretoria last week that the government is seeking to increase support for the dispossessed Palestinian people.
"We want to step up our support of the Palestinians and are investigating a number of peaceful ways to upgrade this support. We have no problem with supporting the Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel," Minister of Arts and Culture Paul Mashatile told a local newspaper.
South Africa's ruling African National Congress has long supported Palestinian independence due to their experience of life under apartheid.
Mashatile also announced a cultural agreement between South Africa and Palestine. He said the commitment was important to the Palestinian cause was particularly strong "because we count the people of Palestine among those patriots who stood by us in our struggle for national liberation."
The BDS campaign, which began in 2005, aims to create pressure on Israel by calling for economic and cultural sanctions against the country.
It demands an end to Israel's occupation of all Arab lands as well as recognition of the rights of Palestinians inside the Occupied Territories.
Omar Barghouti, human rights activist and co-founder of the BDS movement for Palestinian rights, welcomed the announcement.
"Mashatile’s public embracing of BDS indicates that the South African government is seriously considering imposing sanctions on Israel as a result of its intensifying destruction of Palestinian society and denial of basic Palestinian rights," he told Al-Akhbar.
"By imposing meaningful sanctions against Israel, South Africa would establish itself as a world leader in upholding international law and holding to account states that are gravely violating it," he added."

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#BDS: SOUTH AFRICAN ACTIVIST: “PALESTINE CASTS LIGHT ON OUR OWN HISTORY”

"Israel was declared an apartheid state during a session of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine in Cape Town on 7 November.

Among those following the tribunal’s deliberations was a group of young South Africans, including Mbuyiseni Ndlozi of BDS South Africa, a group campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel, and Joni Barnard of Artists Against Apartheid. While travelling by train from Johannesburg to Cape Town, these activists recorded a short video, titled “Shout Out to the Russell Tribunal on Palestine: Live from the Shosholoza Meyl.”

Mbuyiseni states in the video: “I can confidently say that the verdict is that Israel is guilty of apartheid.”

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#BDS: The Cultural Boycott Israel vs. South Africa

"Since the great majority of Palestinian civil society issued its call for boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) against Israel in July 2005 to compel it to fulfil its obligations under international law, there has never been a period with as many BDS achievements as that following the Israeli massacre in Gaza in the winter of 2008-2009 and the bloodbath on the Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla in May 2010. People of conscience around the world seem to have crossed a threshold in challenging Israel’s impunity through effective pressure, not appeasement or “constructive engagement.” This has been most pronounced in the cultural field, where support for the 2004 call by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI)2 has witnessed spectacular growth."

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#BDS: South Africa should support boycott of #Israel

"Speaking at the UN, President Jacob Zuma said he supported the Palestinian Authority’s bid for full membership of the UN for a state of Palestine; proposed by PA President Mahmoud Abbas on Friday September 23. After two decades of fruitless negotiations with Israel (while the latter continued building illegal settlements on Palestinian land, violently displacing Palestinians and stealing their resources), the PA turned its attention to getting international recognition within the UN .
Before commenting on South Africa’s position, it is necessary to look at the nature of the PA’s proposal and the circumstances leading up to it.
The United Nations partition plan in 1947 divided British Mandate Palestine into a “Jewish state” and an “Arab state”. At the time, the UN was not representative of world opinion. Most African states, for example, were still colonised and not members. Today, the UN Security Council continues this pattern of allowing a handful of countries to make decisions on behalf of the rest of the world."


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#BDS: لماذا تعمل السفارة الفلسطينية في جنوب لأفريقيا ضد المقاطعة؟ #PA

قامت سفارة فلسطين في جمهورية جنوب أفريقيا، مشكورة، بالرد على مقالتي المعنونة على صيغة سؤال، (لماذا تعمل السفارة الفلسطينية في جنوب لأفريقيا ضد المقاطعة؟). و بداية لابد من توجيه الشكرللسفارة على اقتطاعها الوقت المطلوب للرد، وهذا شيء لم نتعود عليه من قبل سفاراتنا! وعلي أن أعترف أيضا أنني كنت فور قراءة المقدمة الجميلة على وشك أن أتسرع و أعلن سعادتي بسبب التلميح الواضح في هذه المقدمة بأن ما (اتهمته) مقالتي للسفارة عار عن الصحة، وأنه مبني على (افتراض) غير صحيح! بل أنني فكرت بكتابة اعتذار عن (سوء الظن) و(اتهام) السفارة بشيء لم يحصل.

ولكن ما هي (التهمة)؟

بمجرد الانتهاء من قراءة المقدمة، الجيدة بنيويا، لرد السفارة، والاقتباس الخارج عن السياق من الكواكبي، للدفاع عما اعتبره الكاتب العزيز (اتهام في غير محله)، أغرتني المقالة، بخاتمتها، أن أقتبس من الشاعر المعاصر، د. جمال محجوب:يا رب حزين أنا بينهم،

وأنا منهم ومش منهم!

ولنبدأ بالتعامل مع الحقائق، بناء على طلب السفارة. والحقيقة الواضحة التي تقر بها مقالة السفارة هي أن اللقاء بين الوفد (الطلابي) الاسرائيلي، والذي، وحسب اقرار السفارة أيضا، يشمل في عضويته جنودا خدموا في جيش الاحتلال خلال مجزرة غزة، والسفير الفلسطيني قد تم! 

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#BDS: South African students outraged by #Israel mission

"South African students have spoken out against what they call "Israeli apartheid agents" who plan to visit South African universities in an effort to improve the country's image.

The delegation of 22 Israeli twenty-somethings from a group called What Is Rael will arrive in South Africa next week. The group will visit universities in Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town, with a focus on the University of Johannesburg, which earlier this year cut research ties with Ben Gurion University in Jerusalem."

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#BDS: South African students back boycott of Israel as BDS campaign spreads in Africa

"South African student bodies slam "Israeli Apartheid Agents" and endorse nationwide Israel boycott

This afternoon at a joint press conference held at the student center of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, national representatives of the South African Union of Students (SAUS), the South African Student Congress (SASCO) and the Young Communist League (YCL) slammed the pending trip of "Israeli Apartheid agents" to South Africa."

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#BDS: A view from South Africa on the need to unfriend Israeli universities

"A presentation to the Association of American Geographers Annual Meetings, Seattle, Washington, April 12, 2011. Posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with Patrick Bond’s permission.

This panel is not only devoted to considering arguments about implementing the call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel, but also about broader problems of progressive political positioning and backlash in the academy.

Although I do not deal with the April 2 case of Richard Goldstone’s unprincipled U-turn on the findings of the United Nations commission into Israel’s 2008-09 Gaza invasion, the incident suggests the extent to which South African commentary on the oppression of Palestinians has become acutely politicised. For if Goldstone’s return to his Zionist past – recalling, too, his past as a minor apartheid-era judge (hence as a human rights ally, his zig-zag unreliability, reliability and now unreliability) – serves any purpose aside from empowering Israeli militarists, it will be to compel us to use South Africa as a base from which critical inquiry into the condition of Palestine must now be intensified."

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#BDS: Press release from University of Johannesburg Senate member denies hasbara

"Misleading reports in the Israeli media have suggested that South Africa's University of Johannesburg (UJ) has reinstated its partnership agreement with Israel's Ben-Gurion University (BGU). As a representative on the University of Johannesburg's Senate, its highest decision-making body, and a member of its Senate Academic Freedom Committee responsible for international partnerships, I confirm that UJ's decision to terminate its institutional relationship with BGU remains.

On 23 March this year, in a widely publicized decision, UJ's Senate resolved to terminate its institutional agreement with BGU. The termination of the agreement was the result of BGU's failure to comply with conditions set by the university - including BGU's refusal to end its links with the Israeli military. This decision, based on the "principle of solidarity with the oppressed", was the result of a twelve month democratic, transparent, and consultative process. The campaign for UJ to sever its Israeli links included the support of Nobel Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu and over 400 prominent South African academics."

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#BDS: University of Johannesburg Upholds Academic Boycott of Israel

Turns out the news from yesterday about University of Johannesburg lifting academic boycott off Ben Gurion University was nothing but hasbara!


"The UJ Petition Committee views with contempt attempts by the pro-Israeli lobby to mislead the public by implying that the University of Johannesburg has reinstated its old Memorandum of Understanding with Israel’s Ben-Gurion University (BGU). In fact, the decision to terminate UJ’s institutional agreement with BGU was reaffirmed in a recent follow-up meeting of Senate on 22 June 2011."


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