Ten Ways Israel Is Different from South Africa

 I wrote this piece for the March-April 1988 issue of Palestine Focus. It was reprinted all over the world, including by the PLO in Tunis, though they did not include my name as the author. Note that I have never seen the Israeli document with the same title. I have very slightly edited it for clarity. You can see the original at https://digicoll.lib.berkeley.edu/record/277043?v=pdfUn

Ten Ways Israel Is Different from South Africa

By Steve Goldfield

The New York Times recently reported that the Israeli Foreign Ministry had issued an internal briefing paper entitled “Ten Ways Israel is Different from South Africa.” The Times did not publish the content of that paper. The Israelis were, apparently, hurt by increasingly widespread comparisons, such as by ABC News, between their military occupation over Palestinians and the apartheid system in South Africa. A list of such differences is not easy to compile, but the Palestine Solidarity Committee has risen to the challenge.

1. In South Africa, people can be held without charge under administrative detention for fourteen days without seeing a lawyer. Under Israeli occupation, it is eighteen days. More than three-quarters of African men have been imprisoned, many for pass violations. More than half of Palestinian men have been imprisoned, many for identity card violations.

2. Although in both Israel and South Africa there are both town and house arrest, South Africa has no refugee-camp arrest: it has no refugee camps. To be fair, Israel has no Bantustans.

3. In South Africa, 87 percent of the land is reserved for whites. In Israel, 92 percent of the land is reserved for Jews. In the West Bank and Gaza, more than half the land has been taken from Palestinians … so far.

4. In South Africa, green, black, and gold—the colors of the African National Congress—are illegal. Blacks use it anyway. The African National Congress was banned in 1960; it is illegal to quote ANC leaders. Under Israeli law, red, black, green, and white—the colors of the Palestinian flag—are illegal. Palestinians ignore that law, too. The Palestine Liberation Organization is, of course, banned, and Palestinian newspapers have been closed for publishing interviews with PLO leaders.

5. South Africa has the death penalty and has put many activists to death. Many, such as Steve Biko, have died while in custody. Israel does not have the death penalty, but Palestinians seem to die anyway from beatings and other forms of torture in detention and from shootings on the streets. Photographs published in Israeli and U.S. Newspapers have documented Palestinians entering custody in good condition and leaving Israeli prisons in shrouds.

6. South African Blacks carry passbooks and are punished if they are in the wrong place or do not have a passbook. Palestinians instead have identity cards which they must show to soldiers and police. One form of punishment is to confiscate an identity card, which can lead to immediate deportation and is thus a form of house arrest. Palestinians in the West Bank (except in Jerusalem) and Gaza are also issued different-colored license plates from the ones Israeli citizens receive.

7. African workers cross into white areas to work but are forbidden to sleep there, and many must return to homelands or racially segregated suburbs at night. Working in white-run factories, farms, and mines for very low wages is virtually the only means to earn a livelihood. Palestinians who cross over into Israel to work are also forbidden to sleep there and must return to the West Bank and Gaza at night. Working in Israeli factories, farms, construction, hospitals, or sweeping streets is virtually the only means available to them to earn a livelihood.

8. South African Blacks have no vote, though so-called Coloureds and others have token representation but no real power. West Bank and Gaza Palestinians have no vote, though Palestinians with Israeli citizenship have token representation, virtually no government funds are spent on their needs, and they have no real power.

9. South Africa is a settler state in which the indigenous people greatly outnumber those of European descent. The same was true for Palestine before 1948. Israel is a settler state from which the indigenous people were driven out so that today Israeli Jews outnumber Palestinians.

10. South Africa calls its suppression of the majority of African descent: “Apartheid.” Apartheid is based on a system of privileges granted to those declared “white.” South Africans of Asian and mixed ancestry are second-class citizens. Blacks are not considered citizens and have no rights whatsoever. Israel calls its suppression of Palestinians: “Military Occupation.” Israel's system of privileges, based on its Zionist ideology, gives privileges first to those descended from European Jews, second to Jews from other places, and last and least to Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. Other Palestinians are not considered citizens and have no rights whatsoever.

WOULDN'T YOU RISE UP?

The above are some of the “differences.” A list of similarities between Israel and South Africa and of the longstanding and very close military, political, and economic ties between the two countries (an Israeli journalist described South Africa as “Israel's best ally after the United Statess”) would be very long, indeed. Consider the comments of Raphael Eitan, chief of staff of the Israeli army during the 1982 invasion of Lebanon and currently a member of the Israeli Knesset.

I don't understand this comparison between us and South Africa. What is similar here and there is that both they and we must prevent others from taking us over. Anyone who says that the Blacks are oppressed in South Africa—is a liar. The Blacks there want to gain control of the White majority just like the Arabs here want to gain control over us. And we, too, like the White minority in South Africa, must act to prevent them from taking us over. I was in a gold mine there and I saw what excellent conditions the Black workers there have. So there are separate elevators for Whites and Blacks, so what? That's the way they like it.--Guest lecture at School of Law, Tel Aviv University, December 14, 1987 in Yediot Ahranot, December 25, 1987

Americans oppose apartheid in South Africa. Isn't it about time we stopped our government from supporting and funding the Israeli form of apartheid?

My 1983 Interview with Johnny Makatini, head of international affairs for the African National Congress of South Africa

 In 1979, I met a man named Mfanafuthi (Johnny) Makatini in the lobby of the Polana Hotel in Maputo, Mozambique. We became friends. Johnny was the director of the International Affairs Department and later also the Chief Representative to the United Nations of the African National Congress of South Africa. Had he not died before independence, he likely would have become the minister for foreign affairs in Nelson Mandela's government.

In September 1983, Johnny and I were both in Geneva, Switzerland for the United Nations International Conference on the Question of Palestine. I interviewed him for Palestine Focus. I also published the interview in the appendix of my 1985 book, "Garrison State: Israel's Role in U.S. Global Strategy" and I aired the interview on a series of 30-minute radio shows on KPFA in Berkeley based on material I collected in Geneva. This is the text of that interview, which has very strong echoes in contemporary events.

SG: How does the ANC view the relationship between Israel and South Africa?

MM: The South African regime, presently led by people were were active collaborators with Nazi Germany and, therefore, strongly anti-Semitic, has now become the closest ally of Zionist Israel. This is a strange alliance. But, as David Ben-Gurion said in 1969, they justify it on the basis of so-called comradeship between two regimes under peril.

One thing that brings them together is their total opposition to the right of self-determination for the indigenous people of South Africa and for the Palestinian people. Of course there are other parallels: the use of religion as a basis, or spiritual rock, for the denial of the right to self-determination of indigenous peoples; the claim of predestination, or divine right; and the view of Palestine and South Africa as "promised lands."

The first statesman to visit Israel after the proclamation of Israel was Dr. Malan, the prime minister of South Africa. A number of people who ended up as officials in Israel are South African-born. I could mention [former foreign minister] Abba Eban, [current president] Chaim Herzog, and many others. Financial regulations are relaxed whenever Israel is in serious trouble; a lot of money gets shipped off from South Africa.

Now this collaboration has reached a very high level in the field of economics, in the field of military and nuclear collaboration, and both these regimes, of course, enjoy the support and alliance with the United States. They enjoy the protection of the United States whenever the international community seeks to impose punitive measures for their acts of aggression.

Both the Israeli Zionist regime and the South African regime play a complementary role; both serve as permanent bases for aggression. The role of Israel has been to destabilize and foment insecurity in the Middle East in addition to the oppression of the Palestinian people. Israel engages in total aggression against the Arab countries and operates as the regional gendarme in the service of the United States, international imperialism, whereas Israel extends a carrot to the African countries south of the equator. This is part of the strategy to divide the continent of Africa.

The apartheid regime engages in total aggression against the immediate African countries, i.e., the front-line states that are supporting our struggle, while it seeks to neutralize the Arab countries, since they are the only source where it can get oil which helps to fuel the machinery of oppression and aggression,

This strategy is a pincer movement, and we believe that every Israeli official in Africa, even a technician, is an extension of the South African intelligence service. Therefore, it is out of the question that African countries can have relations with Israel. We welcomed the severance of diplomatic relations in 1973, not just because Israel was occupying Egyptian soil, an African country. For us, it's because Israel is an enemy of the continent of Africa. We deplore the role that Israel is playing--for example, the visit by Sharon to Namibia, to the bases there, making public statements literally calling on the international community to put an end to the arms embargo against South Africa.

Israel's training of Savimbi's forces is an act of hostility to the supreme objectives of the Organization of African Unity [now called the African Union] because the African countries are all supportive of the struggle for the liberation of Namibia and they are all against the destabilization policies carried out by South Africa against Angola. When Israel seeks to establish diplomatic relations with African countries, it is a matter of a Trojan horse, playing the part of a friend, but in fact a total enemy of the continent of Africa. We can go on and on insofar as this collaboration is concerned; the list is very long.

SG: What is the significance of Israel's special relationships with the Bantustans, such as the Ciskei?

MM: First and foremost, it is important to recall that the so-called Ciskei is a tribal entity created by the apartheid reime as part of its policy of Bantustanization, or tribal fragmentation of South Africa. This policy aims to prevent the exercise of the right to self-determination of the indigenous people of South Africa. The international community rejected this policy in 1976 when the first Bantustan, the Transkei, was proclaimed. The General Assembly condemned this as null and void and called on all governments not to recognize or have any contact whatsoever with this tribal entity. Therefore, any regime or government that establishes contact, direct or indirect, with such entities is acting in a hostile manner.

So far, these tribal entities have only been recognized by the apartheid regime, the creator of the problem. The second closest recognition that has come so far is from Israel. There have been visits to Israel by some of these tribal puppets, and there have been promises of assistance and even granting of assistance to the Ciskei puppets. This scheme derives from the collusion between South Africa and the Israeli Zionist reime and also the United States. In other words, we are witnessing an attempt to prepare the ground for the eventual recognition of these tribal creations,

And this takes place at a time when the regime in South Africa has embarked on massive forced removals of the African people who are being taken out of the cities in their millions and dumped in these Bantustans. Already 3.5 million have been removed, and another 2 million are scheduled to be removed pretty soon. This double-pronged approach--the removals and the offensive to win some recognition from certain countries--is aimed at bringing about a situation where the African people can be totally deprived of South African nationhood. Not one African, not one black is to be recognized as South African. In other words, Israel is now in the forefront in policies that are tantamount to total hostility to every position adopted by the Organization of African Unity.

SG: What dangers do you see in the joint Israeli/South African/Taiwanese development of nuclear weapons and cruise missiles which has been exposed since about 1980.

MM: These three--South Africa, Israel, and Taiwan--are all pariah states, regimes that are totally isolated internationally. The United States, in pursuit of its so-called global strategy, users these pariah regimes as regional gendarmes in order to foment instability in certain areas. South Africa is playing that role in southern Africa, creating, training, financing, and equipping dissidents or counterrevolutionaries, such as the Savimbi elements, the LNA in Lesotho, the so-called Mozambican armed resistance, and the Selous Scouts in Zimbabwe.

These counterrevolutionaries have the role of destabilizing the legitimate governments through the destruction of the economic and social infrastructures. Anything done to strengthen the military position of these pariah states is part of that strategy. We have seen nuclear collaboration between the United States and South Africa, between the United States and Israel, as far back as the sixties. But this now includes Taiwan.

Taiwan and Israel have also served as conduits for the arming of South Africa. But now the biggest danger to world peace is that these three pariah states have achieved nuclear capacity thanks to the collaboration between them and some of these western countries.

What dangers do we see? Yes, we see the danger of them being a nuisance. The whole purpose is to try and intimidate international opinion into capitulation. It is intended to bring about a situation whereby the third world or the nonaligned countries can be intimidated into abandoning support of the struggle of the Palestinian people or the South African people. But nothing of that sort will happen. Nothing is going to deter the struggles in both Palestine and in South Africa and Namibia, despite the fact that Israel and South Africa have this nuclear capacity.

It is very important, however, to focus on the role being played by Taiwan because this has tended to escape the notice of a number of countries. Taiwan has friendly relations with some Arab states who were aware of the role that Taiwan is playing. We are absolutely convinced that, once this role is publicized, the Taiwan regime is going to run into serious problems to the point of relations being cut.

Otherwise, the danger is nothing special. We know we are dealing with desperate regimes which are not even signatories to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, but when you take up arms, nothing can deter you, not even the threat of the use of nuclear weapons.