Sanctions against Israel, not Israel's victims

Here's a Guardian comment by Ronnie Kasrils and Victoria Brittain on why the sanctions now being inflicted on the Palestinians by all of the west's powers should instead be imposed on the State of Israel. One piece in particular leapt out at me:

Never in the long struggle for freedom in apartheid South Africa was there a situation as dramatic as in Palestine today: even though children were killed for resisting a second-class education; the liberation movement's leaders were locked up for decades on Robben Island; new leaders were assassinated; church leaders were poisoned; house demolitions and forced removals were frequent; and western governments told South Africans who their leaders should be, and what their policies should be.

The African National Congress confronted the military, economic and social power of white rule with a small guerrilla army, the mass support of the people and a moral authority that won it a following among millions around the world. Many now forget that the abhorrent apartheid system was treated as normal in the powerhouses of the world: entrenched interests meant the western media produced a sanitised version of its suffering and injustice.

So all the oppression that made apartheid South Africa a pariah state is present in Israel's case, together with the support the oppressors had from western governments, only this time it's more intense according to a man who knows. At the end of the comment the Guardian tells us:

Ronnie Kasrils was head of intelligence in the African National Congress's armed wing and is now South Africa's intelligence minister;

But it has to point out that he is writing in a personal capacity because, to its shame, South Africa has special economic ties to Israel.

Anyway, here's the gist of Kasrils and Brittain's argument:

The Palestinians are having sanctions imposed on them for their political choice. But it is Israel, creating new facts on the ground to prevent the emergence of a viable Palestinian state, that should be facing UN sanctions. The UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, should use his last months in office to call for sanctions to bring about the implementation of the ICJ ruling on the Israeli wall, the closure of West Bank settlements and the release of Palestinian political prisoners. And those who care for freedom, peace and justice must build a global Palestine solidarity movement to match the anti-apartheid movement of the 1980s.

Now read on.