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South African Jews Launch Declaration Criticizing Sharon
CAPE TOWN, Dec. 7 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A cabinet minister and some 220 South African Jews Friday launched a declaration criticizing Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's policy of military solution to the conflict in the Middle East, news agencies reported.
Water Affairs Minister Ronnie Kasrils, a South African Jew, said signatories were concerned that Sharon's military policy in the long run would "imperil the very existence of the state of Israel."
Speaking at the launch of the "Declaration of Conscience on the Israeli Palestinian Conflict by South Africans of Jewish Descent", Kasrils said time was running out to solve the crisis in the Middle East.
"The just struggle of the Palestinians for human rights and independence has brought the Holy Land to the point of truth," said Kasrils, who serves in President Thabo Mbeki's government. "Our position is that the only answer to this bitter and bloody conflict is through the so-called two-state solution in terms of the various U.N. resolutions."
He said he felt compelled to speak out on the conflict "in the name of justice and as an act of conscience."
Kasrils, whose views have in the past clashed with more traditional Jewish viewpoints - including the South African Jewish Board of Deputies - said honest and critical debate amongst South African Jews had "sadly withered away under the stifling leadership of conservatives and reactionaries."
Admitting the group of signatories to the declaration was a "minority of South African Jewry," Kasrils nevertheless said historic change came about "by the conscience of a minority seeking the truth."
South Africa has a Jewish community of some 180,000 members, descendents of immigrants mainly from Eastern Europe, and in particular Lithuania, at the end of the 19th century.
Some South African Jews marched alongside Muslims and other people of conscience in protest against Israel and the United States' boycott of Septembers U.N. Conference on Racism; which the two allies walked out of when the world community remarked that Israeli mistreatment of, and aggression against the, Palestinians could be considered racism, and that Zionism could be considered a "racist ideology."
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