By Kouthar Sambo
Our besieged Palestinian brothers and sisters have called, and South Africans have listened.
“When the call was made from our Palestinian brothers and sisters, it is for us to be leading on this, given our own experience of our very own painful past of uniting and resisting against the Apartheid regime,” said Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (PSC) member and General Industries Workers Union of SA (GIWUSA) Secretary in the Western Cape Abeedah Adams.
This comes after the South African Anti-Apartheid Conference Steering Committee (SAAACSC), along with Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (PSC) members, hosted a conference in Johannesburg on Tuesday to discuss the prospect of internationalization of oppressed Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Speaking on VOC’s Drive Time show on Tuesday, Adams said a lot of work has been done behind the scenes, and this has been a long time coming.
“As the Steering Committee member Rev Frank Chikane (Chair) said, appeals made to South Africans in 2022 to support this initiative of a global Apartheid movement against Apartheid Israel,” said Adams.
The conference, explained Adams, was utilized as a platform to officiate the formation of the movement and to announce the upcoming international conference in South Africa during the Nakba period.
Speaking at the conference, Chikane voiced his dismay at the Minister of Defence in a statement released by the SAAACSC.
“Right now, the Palestinian people are facing a genocidal onslaught from Apartheid Israel on an unprecedented scale. In what country other than an apartheid state does the Minister of Defence call the Palestinian people human animals?” expressed Chikane.
“We responded immediately to the Palestinian call, but the conference is the beginning, not the end,” added Chikane.
Furthermore, the international Conference is set to launch a global Anti-Apartheid Movement against Israel’s Regime of Settler Colonialism and Apartheid.
The Conference is scheduled to be held in Gauteng from 10 – 12 May 2024, leading to the 76th commemoration of the Nakba on 15 May 2024.
Photo: VOCfm
