African Union can push Israeli apartheid regime into international isolation

Even by the low standards of a regime used to being regularly condemned for human rights abuses, disregarding international law and committing war crimes, February was a pretty bad month for Israel and its standing in the world.

From revelations about its companies subverting democratic elections across the globe to this week’s scenes of its illegal settlers, protected by its army, carrying out a pogrom against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank town of Huwara, the regime has had its true face exposed to the world in a cruel and meticulous fashion.

At the opening ceremony of the African Union’s annual summit, held at its headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia two weeks ago, there was another nasty surprise and more humiliation in store for the Jewish state. Ambassador Sharon Bar-Li, the deputy director of the Africa Division of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was booted out after turning up, brandishing a non-transferable invitation that had supposedly been issued to Israel’s ambassador to the African Union, Aleli Admasu.

A video posted on social media showed uniformed security personnel escorting her out of the auditorium and Moussa Faki, chairperson of the AU, followed up with a clarification that Israel’s controversial 2021 accreditation as an observer state, which it had pursued for two decades, had actually been suspended and “so we did not invite Israeli officials to our summit”.

Even worse was to come. According to a Draft Declaration On The Situation In Palestine And The Middle East circulated among reporters at the end of the summit, the AU not only expressed “full support for the Palestinian people in their legitimate struggle against the Israeli occupation”, decrying the “unceasing” illegal settlements and Israel’s intransigence but, significantly, urged member states to “end all direct and indirect trade, scientific and cultural exchanges with the State of Israel”.

This latter recommendation, which echoes the demands of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, if implemented, could be the start of a change in Israel’s fortunes, not just on the continent, but across the globe. After all, Africa is no stranger to leading a global movement seeking to isolate and pressure oppressive, ethno-supremacist regimes, having led one targeting the apartheid regime in South Africa in the 1980s. And, in fact, the draft declaration calls on “the international community … to dismantle and prohibit the Israeli system of colonialism and apartheid”.

Read full article at Al Jazeera

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