Faizel Patel, Radio Islam News, 2014-07-11

Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi joined hundreds of protesters on the blessed day of Jumu’ah (Friday) in criticising the Israeli occupation of Gaza and attacks on Palestine.

The protesters gathered at the entrance of the OR Tambo Building in Pretoria, the headquarters of the department of international relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), calling for the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador.

More than 200 activists lined the busy Soutpansberg Road chanting, “Free, Free Palestine”.

Some shouted: “Down with Israeli apartheid, down” waving flags and placards, while others chanted “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

International media reports on Friday afternoon said two more Palestinians were killed, raising the death toll in four days to 100.

On Thursday, the ANC described the Israeli military’s attacks on the Gaza strip as “barbaric”.

“The state of Israel has turned the occupied territories of Palestine into permanent death camps,” deputy secretary general Jessie Duarte said in a statement.

“Of course the killing of any child, irrespective of race, colour or creed, must be condemned and the death of [three] Israeli young people is surely as senseless as any other death.”

However, the killing needed to stop, she said.

The ANC Youth League also made its voice heard.

The League condemned the attacks on the “defenceless Palestinian people of the Gaza Strip and other parts of Occupied Palestinian”.

“This is systematic genocide, and the State of Israel has long ago lost its right to be considered as a state with any semblance of human rights ethics,” it said in a statement.

It says South Africa should “deny the State of Israel any formal recognition”.

“Apartheid was wrong for South Africans, and is wrong for Palestinians,” the League said.

Three Israeli teenagers – Naftali Fraenkel, 16, Gilad Shaer, 16 and Eyal Yifrah, 19 – were kidnapped and murdered last month.

AFP at the time reported that the three disappeared from a popular hitch-hiking spot near the southern West Bank Gush Etzion settlement late on 12 June.

The Israeli military found the teenagers’ bodies in a field northwest of Hebron on 30 June.

On 2 July, 16-year-old Palestinian teenager Mohammed Abu Khdeir was burnt to death.

This reportedly triggered days of clashes in east Jerusalem and Arab Israeli towns.

Scores of people have died during the Gaza raids and Israel’s Operation Protective Edge, launched early on Tuesday to stop rocket fire reportedly by Hamas militants.

The SA Jewish Board of Deputies and the SA Zionist Federation condemned Duarte’s statement.

(Twitter: @Faizie143)