‘No leader of the ANC Youth League can support Israeli Apartheid’

The ANC Youth League (ANC YL) has reiterated its policy to discourage relations with Israel. This, announced Secretary General Njabulo Nzuza in a press release on Thursday, was made very clear by South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma in his 8 January address.

The ANC YL said that it is “disturbed” that a certain individual is parading around on a pro-Israel trip in the USA claiming to be a youth leader of the ANC. “This violates our stance and is dishonest, as the individual is no leader of ours,” said Nzuza. “Furthermore, it is shocking to see that the individual concerned is apparently listed on the website of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs as an official at the Israeli Embassy [in Pretoria].”

According to the organisation’s press release, any South African “caught in bed with the enemy should be distanced by progressive forces.” The person in question, or anyone else masquerading as an ANC youth leader at counter revolutionary pro-Israel events “must consider their membership revoked as they have placed themselves outside the organisation and the movement’s policies and resolutions.”

The ANC National Executive Committee has been very clear on this issue. “It decided in 2014 to take a position in favour of an Israel travel boycott when it declared its support for a cultural, academic and education boycott of Israel including travel bans for members and leaders of the ANC and the Alliance; Members of the Cabinet; Members of Parliament; and Government Officials.”

Furthermore, insisted Nzuza, the ANC YL is a revolutionary youth organisation with a duty to show solidarity with the oppressed. “The ANC, our mother body, at its Mangaung conference, declared that it is unequivocal in its support for the Palestinian people in their struggle for self-determination, and unapologetic in its view that the Palestinians are the victims and the oppressed in the conflict with Israel.” Our policy, he added, is not to side with the oppressor, in this case Israel.

The ANC Youth League statement said that it is distancing itself from, and condemning, the Embassy of Israel in South Africa and those lackeys who advance the agenda of the “imperialist” Israeli regime. “We are not up for sale and refuse to be associated with those captured by such foreign agents.”

In conclusion, the youth organisation welcomed President Zuma’s recent #IsraeliApartheidWeek Palestine lecture and recommits itself to solidarity with all oppressed peoples around the world.