South Africa’s convenient definition of genocide targets only Israel

A major trend in contemporary world politics is the assault on truth. Governments everywhere are attempting to persuade people to believe that facts have no validity, that there are always alternate facts instead and words mean what they want them to mean.  

South Africa’s charge of genocide by Israel is only the most recent manifestation of this trend, which has long been exploited for antisemitic purposes. Apart from Israel’s resolute and convincing defense of its activities in Gaza that are themselves responses to Hamas’s pogrom in October, this indictment confirms South Africa’s regime is using antisemitism — itself a form of ethno-racial hatred that has led to one genocide — for its own political gain.

Although it would be easy to dismiss South Africa’s charge as a political stunt to curry favor with Palestinians and their supporters; this charge also reflects the degradation of that regime. To be sure, there is a long history of emotional identification with the Palestinian cause.

Nevertheless, this charge reflects the inherent corruption of the race and colonialism-based discourse on the Middle East as well as Pretoria’s one-sided moral bookkeeping.

Despite numerous genocides in Africa — where one might justifiably find a basis for genuine solidarity with the victims, South Africa remained silent. It certainly is not speaking out particularly loudly about the ongoing Sudanese war.  

Indeed President Cyril Ramaphosa recently met with Sudanese rebel leader Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo, who is accused of ethnic killings and ties to past genocides. Neither have we heard its outcry against the genocides perpetrated in Myanmar against the Rohingya people or by China against the Uyghurs.

In fact, South Africa abstained from a United Nations resolution condemning the Myanmar military for its atrocities and refused to sign a separate U.N. letter condemning China’s actions in Xinjiang

Worse yet South Africa, in its role as president of the BRICS organization — comprising China, Brazil, Russia, India and itself as members — invited Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is under indictment by the International Court of Justice, to the organization’s annual summit in Johannesburg last year. Obviously, Russia’s brutality in Ukraine, which numerous dispassionate observers have labeled as genocide, does not count as such in South Africa’s twisted moral reckoning and universe. 

The conclusion that South Africa has two sets of books for international morality is no less visible in its presentation to the International Court of Justice. That presentation all but completely omitted Hamas’s pogrom on Oct. 7 that inflicted unspeakable tortures on the 1,200 killed and 240 or so prisoners, many of whom were raped, tortured and otherwise traumatized in violation of every law of war. 

Moreover, South Africa seems not to care that Hamas’s charter explicitly calls for the extermination of Jews, not just Israelis. And if that were not enough, it is now launching a global terrorist campaign to kill Jews in Europe if not elsewhere.

Under the circumstances, it is apparent that Israel is acting in self-defense under the U.N. Charter’s Article 51. And while the war in Gaza undoubtedly represents a profound human tragedy, we should constantly bear in mind that this is the war Hamas wanted and worked to provoke. 

It wants and desperately needs thousands of martyrs to gain sympathy for its cause. That is why the Israel Defense Forces reported finding weapons in hospitals, schools, apartment bedrooms, including children’s bedrooms, mosques, etc. to invite retribution that it can then use among global audiences to escape defeat and repeat the experiment some years later. 

This is the organization, along with fellow genocidaires, that South Africa, itself a notoriously corrupt and crime-ridden regime, has chosen to extol. Apparently, South Africa thinks that by acting in this way it will shore up its falling domestic support and gain foreign policy support and benefits from other, similarly oriented movements.   

But beyond these reasons, and scoring points with antisemites for crass political gain, South Africa has contributed mightily to the contemporary war against truth. 

As Israel has contended, the charge of genocide is an outstanding example of the political tactic of turning an opponent’s strong point against them, as Hamas is a genocidal organization and carries out genocidal operations like that of Oct. 7. It is, therefore, no accident that Pretoria sidestepped the issue of Hamas’s attack and omitted mention of Israel’s efforts to warn Gazans of impending hostilities or alleviate their suffering, for those do not fit its narrative.

Thus, the South African regime has deliberately thrown its lot with those authoritarian and antisemitic organizations, be they states, movements or international organizations for whom truth is dispensable and merely another factor to be exploited in a permanent political struggle. This strategy, which has long functioned in antisemitic campaigns, also serves Arab elites as a self-exculpatory mechanism to hide the roots of their and the Palestinians’ failure to establish a viable state, as well as other movements’ explanations for their country’s misfortune.  

In these conditions, antisemitism can be served up like a menu item and come in any version that appeals to the customer’s taste, thereby perpetuating the ongoing hatred of the other that lies at the root of this and other forms of racism. And for that reason, Nelson Mandela’s legacy deserves better stewards.

Stephen Blank, Ph.D., is a Foreign Policy Research Institute senior fellow and independent consultant focused on the geopolitics and geostrategy of the former Soviet Union, Russia and Eurasia. He is a former professor of Russian national security studies and national security affairs at the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College and a former MacArthur fellow at the U.S. Army War College.