SA Jewry somewhere between Kevin Bloom and Amir Mizroch

SA Jewry somewhere between Kevin Bloom and Amir Mizroch

By: Ilan Solomons

I like many of you have been following, with some level of interest, this debate taking place in mainstream South African media between Kevin Bloom and Amir Mizroch – over the true nature of the Jewish communities’ attitude towards Israel. It struck me that neither of the authors can in all honesty claim to be active members of the current SA Jewish community and therefore I felt as some one who has been actively involved in Jewish communal matters and specifically with regards to the Israel-Palestine question that I should be a bit chutzpadik and add my two rands worth.

Kevin Bloom is not entirely wrong when he says that sections of the Jewish community of South Africa are in total agreement with the policies and practices of the State of Israel, especially when it comes to dealing with Palestinians. Where he is deeply mistaken is that he presents this camp within the community as the only significant one, one that will defend Israel’s policies blindly. This is just not the case.

So what about the remaining majority? Well to be frank some are just too ignorant of situation and have no views either way. Then there are those who are pro-Israel but would dearly like her to live side by side with an independent Palestinian State in internationally recognized borders, and then there are the genuine far right fascists who quite literally bully the leadership into taking the most meek and mild criticisms of Israel, in cases where she has done wrong.

I was involved in two major Jewish organizations until very recently. The one was Bnei Akiva – a religious Zionist youth movement – and the other being the South African Union of Jewish Students (SAUJS). Bnei Akiva is one of the biggest Jewish youth movements in South Africa and in Israel has taken very hawkish positions on matters relating to the Palestinians’, however in my time with the movement it declared itself ‘apolitical’ and thus it was able to be more open to dialogue and discussion on sensitive matters relating to Israel-Palestine. Many within the leadership of the movement were very keen to explore a broad educational policy relating to the history and politics of the region. This culminated in Bnei Akiva inviting the Palestinian Ambassador to South Africa, Dr Ali Halimeh in 2010 to its community centre in Glenhazel to give a presentation on the history and politics of the conflict from a Palestinian perspective. This is an incredibly noteworthy achievement which was well received by most who attended the presentation and who were able to engage with a representative of the Palestinian people, for many it was the first time they had actually ever met a Palestinian let alone a member of the Palestinian Authority.

SAUJS hosted a panel discussion with the Ambassador Halimeh and veteran anti-Apartheid activist and now anti-occupation activist Benjamin Pogrund at Wits University, where the issue of ending the occupation and establishing an independent Palestinian State was the main message that came out from the discussion. Obviously there were many very unhappy members of the Jewish community, ironically they were less angered at Ambassador Halimehs' remarks but at Benjamin Pogrunds’ comments concerning the illegality of settlements in the West Bank and the human rights violations that Israel was causing as result of its brutal occupation, and that he seemed to side with Ambassador Halimeh on most issues. Most Jewish students found the discussion enlightening and learnt a great deal from the event.

SAUJS regularly issued statements calling for a just and fair peace that would result in the establishment of an independent Palestinian State along side the State of Israel and this has been a long standing policy of the movement.

It would however be deeply dishonest of me not to mention the following story of intolerance that I suffered at the hands of those who were less open minded about promoting Israeli-Palestinian peace. When I was in my final year as a councillor for Bnei Akiva I was appointed as deputy education officer for the end of year camp. One of the important aspects of this role was to promote educational understanding on Israel. I was given as a gift from the Palestinian Embassy a badge with a Palestinian flag along side a South African one, so I decided that I was going to wear this badge along side my Israel badges on a Friday Night – which is sacred in Judaism – as a symbol that I was pro Israeli-Palestinian peace which I thought was something important for my fellow councillors and campers to see. No big deal right? Within minutes of me having them on my jacket some of my fellow councillors were trying to rip them off my jacket. I protested and they grudgingly stopped. As I was about to sit down in the Synagogue for the beginning of the Friday Night Service, in stormed one of the movements Rabbi’s from Israel, who had obviously been informed of what I was doing and said something along these lines “Ilan if you don’t remove those bloody things from your jacket immediately I’m going to personally rip them off and smack your head in”. This as you can imagine caused a bit of commotion I got up and walked out of the Synagogue and was quite shaken by the incident, I mean you don’t expect that type of ‘deranged’ behaviour from a Rabbi.

 I had known that I was playing with fire and I valued my health more, as I knew that this Rabbi had lived as settler deep in the heart of the occupied territories and was known for his extremism, so I decided to remove not only my Palestinian badges but the Israeli ones as well as small form of protest. Many of the campers and my fellow councillors had seen this incident and were deeply disturbed, some wanted to put on the badges as sign of protest. Well firstly I didn’t have enough badges to go around and secondly I had made a point which I thought was enough. If I continued this protest I would have had all my other educational programmes scrapped and those educational programmes were more important than causing a brawl on the Bnei Akiva campsite on the Sabbath.

After the camp I had several meetings with the then Chairman of Bnei Akiva to stop or as he put it ‘re-think’ what I was doing, mainly because there were those who were concerned I and some others were doing a disservice to the Israel and Zionism. It eventually reached a point when the Chairman was threatening to issue a statement that would state Bnei Akiva was going to disassociate itself from me, even though I was no longer a member of the organization. So desperate where some to suppress what I was saying and doing at the time that they set up a meeting which was overseen by someone who I have only the highest regard for, the former anti-Apartheid activist Rabbi Bentzion Isaacson. He was also the first South African Rabbi to establish formal contact with the PLO while he was himself in exile in Zimbabwe. Nothing came of these heated discussions, and in the end it seemed there was more bark than bite.

I have had people spit at me on several occasions as they felt I had betrayed the Zionist/Jewish cause by establishing close links with Palestinians and by helping to strengthen ties between the Jews, Muslims and specifically Palestinians. These few pockets of extremists are present in all communities and the Jewish community is no exception. The organizations that I served largely received positive feedback for the efforts we undertook and even the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD), Zionist Fed and Israel Centre were accepting on some level.

The point is that the SA Jewish community is by no means at present monolithic in its views or opinions of Israel. I only wish that the community had more people like the late Arthur Goldreich, a man who fought for the State of Israel on its founding, and was a member of the ANC and its armed resistance wing. He was a devout Zionist and Humanist, who loved the State of Israel dearly but was appalled by its practices in the Occupied Territories, he had the most important thing that one needs in the SA Jewish community and that was legitimacy. The Jewish community of South Africa is only too aware that Israel is important to world Jewry but that the Palestinians have legitimate claim to self determination along side the State of Israel.

 We desperately require someone like Goldreich who can say these words without having the baggage of Kasrils, Goldberg, Nathan Geffen, Doron Isaacs and the like that they can be accused of not being active members of the community, or that they do not live in Israel or have no right to comment as suggested by Amir Mizroch and that they do not have the best interests Israel and the Jewish people at heart.

*Note that if readers would like to get a sense of the diversity of views that exist in the Jewish community both dovish and hawkish I suggest they go to check out the following links http://chutzpahonline.blogspot.com/2010/08/view-of-our-palestinian-israeli-guest.html and http://www.myshtetl.co.za/community/israel/israelnews/halachos-land-peace-what-hit