The South African Jewish Report accused South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa of being the first sitting head of state to sign an international petition demanding that Israel release convicted terrorist Marwan Barghouti.
Ramaphosa chose Freedom Day, 27 April, to sign a statement that called for the “immediate release” of Barghouti, who was found guilty of leading and planning multiple terror attacks against Israeli civilians during the Second Intifada.
An Israeli court convicted Barghouti in 2004 on five counts of murder and one of attempted murder, sentencing him to five consecutive life terms plus 40 years in prison.
Barghouti was the Palestinian leader who forged, with Yasser Arafat, what was cutely called the Intifada, a terror campaing that murdered a thousand Israelis.
Remember that the next time you hear the mob shouting to “Globalise the Intifada” which is resulting in the murder of Jews in Western countries everywhere today.
Barghouti’s shadow hangs over every murder.
But Ramaphosa says that Barghouti is “an elected representative unjustly imprisoned for 23 years, who is widely recognised as a Pal
estinian ‘Mandela’ figure.”
He says that his imprisonment “constitutes a grave injustice and stands as a major barrier to peace.”
The view from Israel is that South Africa’s Palestinian “victim” is, in reality, the leader of a mass murdering death cult.
That is why he received a life sentence in Israel where the death penalty, had it been on the law books, would have been a better form of justice.
And yet, this high level support for this mass murderer is characterized as being a stand for justice and human rights.
South Africa, under the Ramaphosa blighted leadership, projects immorality and a strong whiff of anti-Semitism disguised as human rights.
The Ahmed Kathrada Foundation (AKF) said that Ramaphosa’s endorsement “reinforces South Africa’s duty to stand for justice, human rights, and international law”, and that it aligns with South Africa’s case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Barghouti was a leader of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, which were responsible for numerous suicide bombings and shooting attacks during the Second Intifada. He is accused of orchestrating, financing, and facilitating terrorist acts. He’s been imprisoned for the murder of a Greek monk in Jerusalem in 2021, the killing of a woman in the West Bank in 2002, and three murders in Tel Aviv in 2002.
The AKF called on heads of state, parliamentarians, and political leaders to “follow Ramaphosa’s lead, sign the pledge, and publicly demand Barghouti’s release.”
Executive Director of the Middle East Africa Research Institute, Benji Shulman, says Ramaphosa’s support of Barghouti is not new.
When Ramaphosa was deputy president in 2017, he and a number of Cabinet ministers embarked on a 24-hour hunger strike in support of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, including Barghouti.
“Proponents of Barghouti’s release like to compare him to Nelson Mandela. However, Barghouti was imprisoned for his role in the murder of Israelis during the Second Intifada,” says Shulman. “Nelson Mandela was never convicted of murdering anyone, and, in fact, said that ‘terrorism inevitably reflected poorly on those who used it, undermining any public support it might otherwise garner’.”
“The violence of Barghouti haunts the campaign [for his release] and those associated with it to this day,” says Shulman.
Ray Hartley, who leads the Platform for African Democrats, says, “This is yet another unwise escalation of South Africa’s partisan approach to international relations, and it will aggravate an already strained relationship with the United States. Ramaphosa should ask himself why he is the first head of state to sign this. Perhaps others are judging this more wisely.”
Former senior White House official Lawrence J Haas, a senior fellow for US foreign policy at the American Foreign Policy Council think tank, told the SA Jewish Report that “the notion that any head of state would sign such a petition to support a convicted terrorist who is serving multiple life sentences is morally reprehensible”.
However, “while outrageous,” it’s not surprising given South Africa’s decidedly anti-Israel activities in recent years, says Haas.
“I don’t know that it will significantly affect US-South Africa relations, simply because it’s another step down the path that South Africa has been walking openly for years.”
David May, a research analyst at US think tank the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, says that comparisons between Barghouti and Mandela are not only false, but “tarnish Madiba’s legacy.”
“Mandela should not be associated with the mastermind of the Second Intifada, a wave of terrorism that claimed the lives of more than 1 000 Israelis,” says May. “Perhaps South African politicians should focus on protecting their constituents from violence, rather than subjecting Israelis to it.”
He says Barghouti’s popularity on the Palestinian street is an indictment of Palestinian political culture. “Domestically, Barghouti’s role in killing Israelis is an asset, not a liability. Perhaps this is a good opportunity for African National Congress (ANC) leaders to shine a light on the ramifications of Palestinian violence, an important angle intentionally erased from the ANC’s lawfare campaign against Israel at the ICJ and beyond.”
Elliott Abrams, a senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at a prominent non-partisan think tank, the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, DC, has criticised The New York Times for calling Barghouti “a Palestinian leader and parliamentarian,” ignoring his terrorist ties.
Abrams told the SA Jewish Report that the US government will probably pay little attention to Ramaphosa’s signing of the petition, but “for those in the US who do pay attention, they will note that Ramaphosa is the only head of government to sign this petition on behalf of a convicted murderer, and it will lower their opinion of him. Terrorism remains a great danger throughout the world, and his apparent indifference to it is contemptible.”
US foreign policy expert Michael Walsh says Ramaphosa’s signing of the petition will be “strongly opposed by some Israeli political factions and US special interest groups.”
However, it is “unclear what the long-term impact will be on US-South Africa relations” because “last year, Trump indicated that he might be willing to call upon [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu to release Barghouti despite the potential domestic political blowback.”
Walsh explains that “at some point, the US is going to have to fill the leadership vacuum in the Palestinian Territories. When that time comes, the Trump administration may be willing to make the same kinds of trade-offs that were made to fill the leadership vacuum in Syria.”
Yet Democratic Alliance spokesperson on international relations and cooperation, Ryan Smith, says that “it is telling that President Ramaphosa has signed a petition for the release of Barghouti, but not for the release of opposition politicians in his own region such as Zimbabwe, Tanzania, and Uganda; and all the while, turning a blind eye to the massacre of innocent civilians in Iran.”
For Smith, “This is no sign of solidarity, it is yet another reflection of the ANC’s highly selective and performative morality, which it applies exclusively based on how much political mileage it can get.”
The South African Zionist Federation (SAZF) condemned the AKF for championing the petition. “Barghouti was convicted on multiple counts of murder and attempted murder and is serving five life sentences. That record is not contested; it is established in a court of law,” says SAZF spokesperson Rolene Marks.
Yet the AKF “has chosen to lend its name to a campaign that elevates a convicted terrorist. This is a wholesale abandonment of principles”, says Marks. “It tells victims of terrorism that their suffering is negotiable. It signals that the deliberate killing of civilians can be excused, repackaged, and even celebrated. And it drags South Africa’s already strained moral credibility even lower.”
In short, South Africa is the nation with the lowest sense of decency and virtue outside of the radical Jew-hating Middle East.
