Wednesday, September 26, 2018
Elder of Ziyon
Continuing from last time, a BDS debate involving South Africa usually
follows certain predictable patterns.
BDS advocates claim that those involved in the struggle to topple
Apartheid in SA see the Arab-Israeli conflict in the same terms with Israelis
serving as stand-ins for the Boers.
Various names are dropped, but since most Americans are unfamiliar with
the cast of characters (and because most students at schools targeted for BDS
campaigns weren’t even born when Apartheid existed or ended), the only two
names with any resonance are Desmond Tutu and, of course, Nelson Mandela.
Because Reverend Tutu is a four-square champion for BDS, his support
for a boycott or divestment program can only be trumped by invoking the name of
Mandela whose relationship with Jews and Israel is more ambiguous. One of the reasons an attempt a few years ago
to break ties between the University of Johannesburg and Ben-Gurion University
in Israel failed was because of Mandela’s involvement in the relationship
between the two centers of learning. This
is why the endorsement of Mandela is so sought after that BDS advocates are not
beyond using fraud to pretend to obtain it.
Like most things, the actual relationship between Israel and South
Africa (like the relationship between South Africa and every other country in
the world – including Israel’s loudest critics) was a complicated affair. As is usually the case when $$$s mix with
global politics, few hands are clean when it comes to international affairs
vis-à-vis pre-Mandela SA. And South
Africa’s relationship with Israel since Apartheid fell is as multi-faceted as
one would expect between two such intense and vibrant societies.
But when BDSers lay down their Tutu card (as they do in nearly every BDS
battle) or supporters and opponents of boycotts try to read the Mandela tea
leaves, they are taking for granted the assumption that the South African
experience gives those that fought against Apartheid unique moral weight in
discussion on other topics (notably the Middle East). But, without diminishing the courage and
patience of all those involved with the successful overthrow of Apartheid, is
this a reasonable assumption?
After all, if suffering and courage lent all who practiced it
unquestioned moral authority, why are Jews (who suffered one of history’s
greatest mass murders only to revive and build a thriving nation and Diaspora)
treated by BDSers as uniquely damaged by these experiences? Apparently, if the South African experience created
saints who cannot be criticized in any way (lest critics be banished from
decent society), the Holocaust turned Jews into proto-Nazis who learned nothing
from the experience other than how to behave like their former tormentors.
This knot can be untangled if you look at the world not through the
lens of ideological need, but of actual human experience. As has been pointed out before, the BDS
“movement” is part of an “Apartheid Strategy” designed to brand Israel as the
inheritor of the mantle of the late 20th century’s most reviled
nation and political system. But on its
own, the “Apartheid Strategy” is simply an accusation, one that can be counter
by facts and blunted by counter-accusation of the Apartheid-like nature of
Israel’s most vocal critics.
Which is why the endorsement of those involved with the original fight
against the original Apartheid becomes so critical. And just as importantly, we are asked to take
it on faith that any South African endorsing the Israel=Apartheid analogy must
be doing so based on nothing more than an unvarnished quest for justice.
But South Africa is a real place containing real people involved with
real political (now geopolitical) decision-making. Yes, they won a marvelous victory against a
vile and bigoted political system, and projects like Truth and Reconciliation
commissions showed the world that there were options other than vengeance when
old orders make way for new. But why
were the Arabs states who supplied Apartheid with the oil it needed to run its
machinery of repression given a unique pass from this Truth and Reconciliation
process? Why do South Africa’s leaders,
considered saints when they hurl their barbs at the Jewish state, behave with
the same mix of vision, patriotism, virtue, venality, greed and hypocrisy seen
in every other political leader in human history?
The voice of South Africans with regard to the Middle East (as with any
other issue) are many and varied and the motivation behind some South Africans
(including Tutu) endorsing BDS projects can and should be subjected to the same
scrutiny as any political statement made by any other political leader. No supporter of Israel I have ever met has
demanded that all political discussion stop because a Jew (even a Holocaust
survivor) has spoken (quite the opposite, in fact). And without in any way diminishing the valor
of those who helped bring down the Apartheid system, it is well past time that
the same approach be taken with regard to South Africans.
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