Forecast Highs

UPDATE: Hajaig has apologized:

The Jewish Board of Deputies is satisfied with deputy foreign minister Fatima Hajaig’s second apology, made after President Kgalema Motlanthe held “discussions” with her about them, it said on Thursday.

“To the extent that my statement may have caused hurt and pain, I offer an unequivocal apology for the pain it may have caused to the people of our country, and the Jewish community in particular,” said Hajaig in a statement.

She said she regretted the “inference” made by some people that she was “anti-Jewish”.

“I do not believe that the cause of the Palestinians is served by anti-Jewish racism.”

Hajaig today said that at a point in her talk, unrelated to the South African community, “I conflated Zionist pressure with Jewish influence.”

She said as a member of government and the African National Congress she subscribed to values and principles of non-racialism.

This followed a furore over anti-Semitic statements made by Hajaig at a rally in Lenasia last month.

“The SA Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) commends President Motlanthe and his Cabinet for ensuring that Deputy Foreign Minister Fatima Hajaig has now made an unequivocal apology for, and full retraction of the unacceptable anti-Semitic statements,” the board said in a statement.

“The SAJBD thanks President Motlanthe and his Cabinet for the decisive and forthright manner in which they have addressed this serious matter.”

The board rejected a previous apology made by the deputy minister as “she had very clearly avoided addressing, let alone repudiating, the blatantly anti-Semitic sentiments originally expressed by her”.

HERE IS THE ORIGINAL STORY

South Africa’s Jewish Board of Deputies has lodged a complaint of hate speech with the country’s Human Rights Commission against Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Fatima Hajaig of the ruling ANC.

“In fact, no matter which government comes into power whether Republican or Democratic, whether Barack Obama or George Bush, the control of America, just like the control of most Western countries is in the hands of Jewish money, and if Jewish money controls their country, you cannot expect anything else,” Hajaig was recorded as saying, to thunderous applause.

Hajaig made the anti-Semitic comments at a pro-Palestinian rally in the Lenasia township outside of Johannesburg earlier January at the height of the Gaza war.

The January 14 rally was organized by the Congress of South African Trade Union (COASATU), the Palestine Solidarity and the SA Council of Churches.

The Board of Deputies called Hajaig’s comments “an embarrassment to South Africa,” according to South African media.
In its complaint, the board said the statement demonstrated “a clear intention to be hurtful, be harmful or incite harm and especially to promote or propagate hatred against the Jewish people”
The associate director of the board, David Saks, told Business Day the statement was anti-Semitic because it alleged “that Jews are a scheming, manipulative, behind-the-scenes influence in their host societies, who control the affairs of the societies for their own selfish, usually evil, gains”.
Saks said the idea of “a Jew who uses his money to undermine the wellbeing of the human race” was “a classic anti-Semitic stereotype”.
The board wants Hajaig to “withdraw her comments, distance herself completely from sentiments of this nature, and apologize.” National Chairperson Zev Krengel told The Jerusalem Post that apart from the apology, the board wants Hajaig to “educate herself” on anti-Semitism and the Holocaust, possibly with visits to Cape Town’s Holocaust Museum or even Israel’s Yad Vashem.

The Jewish group said Hajaig crossed the line between being pro-Palestinian, which was legitimate, to anti-Semitism, which was not.

According to E News in SA, there has been no response from Hajaig.

Foreign affairs spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa said the department was “not au fait with the contents of the alleged statement made by the deputy minister”, and that Hajaig was in Japan on official business. She returns to SA Friday. The Jewish governing body says it will give the cabinet a not unlimited period of time to convene and decide on what to do.

Human Rights Commission spokesman Vincent Moaga told the Post that the commission was to deal with the complaint in the coming days. He said that initially the commission had to decide if it was the right body to handle the complaint, after which it will assess whether there was an opportunity to mediate between the parties, or take the matter to court. The commission is also waiting to see how Hajaig responds before making a decision on the complaint. The commission has dealt with hate speech cases before, including one case where the Minister of Labor made unfavorable comments about Chinese people. After a complaint was issued the minister was cooperative, and at a meeting between the sides, a solution was found, Moaga said.
Should Hajiag not respond to the satisfaction of the Board of Deputies, and mediation efforts fail, there is a good chance the Human Rights Commission will take the minister to court on charges of hate speech. South Africa has a zero tolerance policy on racism and xenophobia. Should the commission not take Hajaig to court, the board of deputies will do so itself, Krengel said. Should this happen, the board will petition the country’s Equality Court, which was set up to hear racism and bigotry cases.

On December 29, just two days after the start of Operation Cast Lead, Hajaig summoned Israeli ambassador Dov Segev-Steinberg.

Segev-Steinberg said he had been “bashed very, very badly” by Hajaig when he was summoned to her office to explain the Israeli army’s push into Gaza.

There are some 70,000 to 75,000 Jews in South Africa. Over the past 18 months, four percent of the community has left, mostly to Israel, Australia and Canada.