Yes, you read that correctly.
In an interview with South African journalists, PA President Mahmoud Abbas had this to say:
“No, we do not support the boycott of Israel. But we ask everyone to boycott the products of the settlements..But we don’t ask anyone to boycott Israel itself. We have relations with Israel, we have mutual recognition of Israel.”
I do not have a link to the online report, but rather a screenshot of the actual newspaper report, courtesy of Jethro Steve.
This renders BDSHoles like Roger Waters, Ali Abumination, Lauren Booth and other assorted scum and villainy more extreme than Abbas on this issue.
Not to mention Hamas!
Update: Abumination and others are livid!
http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/south-africa-abbas-opposes-boycott-israel
Mahmoud Abbas, de facto leader of the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, has made his clearest statement in opposition to the global campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) on Israel in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
His comments have drawn strong condemnation from Palestinian and South African activists.
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“Oblivious” to Palestinian struggle
Abbas’ comments conflict “with the Palestinian national consensus that has strongly supported BDS against Israel since 2005,” Omar Barghouti told The Electronic Intifada.
A founder of the BDS movement, Barghouti emphasized that he was commenting in a personal capacity.
“There is no Palestinian political party, trade union, NGO [nongovernmental organization] network or mass organization that does not strongly support BDS. Any Palestinian official who lacks a democratic mandate and any real public support, therefore, cannot claim to speak on behalf of the Palestinian people when it comes to deciding our strategies of resistance to Israel’s regime of occupation, colonization and apartheid,” Barghouti said.
The Palestinian civil call for BDS urges “people of conscience all over the world to impose broad boycotts and implement divestment initiatives against Israel similar to those applied to South Africa in the apartheid era” and does not limit such campaigns only to settlement goods.
“Any Palestinian official who today explicitly speaks against boycotting Israel – particularly in a country like South Africa, where the ruling party, leading trade unions, churches and other civil society groups have warmly endorsed BDS – only shows how aloof he is from his own people’s aspirations for freedom, justice and equality, and how oblivious he is to our struggle for their inalienable rights,” Barghouti added.
Israel and its lobby in South Africa will be particularly pleased to hear Abbas’ comments, which come just weeks after South Africa’s foreign minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabanesaid that her country was reducing its ties with Israel.
Akin to Bantustan leaders
Salim Vally, spokesperson of the Palestine Solidarity Committee in South Africa, told The Electronic Intifada that Abbas’ comments were “shocking” and represented an “attack on the global solidarity movement.”
Abbas’ words were “akin to what our erstwhile bantustan leaders would have said and this has the potential of undoing much of the work of the solidarity movement which is supported by the vast majority of South Africans,” Vally added.
Bantustans were nominally independent “states” set up by the apartheid regime with subservient leaders to disguise and legitimize apartheid. “Mandela and his movement fought against the Bantustan leaders all their careers,” Vally said.
Undermining Palestinian struggle
This is not the first time Abbas and the Palestinian Authority have sought to undermine the increasingly high-profile BDS movement.
In 2010, the PA launched a short-lived campaign urging Palestinians to boycott settlement goods. While welcomed by many, as I wrote at the time, its true purpose appeared to be to undermine the broader BDS movement.
Abbas himself took part in that campaign while urging trade with Israel. “We are not boycotting Israel, because we have agreements and imports from it,” he said.
Trade with Israel directly benefits Palestinian elites and the Palestinian Authority, which is entirely reliant on Israeli goodwill.
A now-defunct PA website supposedly meant to encourage the boycott of settlement goods even stated that “Regarding trade with Israel, the Palestinian Ministry of Economy confirms continuing its cooperation as it was agreed at the [1994] Paris summit.”
The Abbas-led PA is deeply entrenched in the Israeli occupation and relies on Israel for weapons to use in its crackdown against any form of Palestinian resistance.
As recently as October, Abbas boasted about the work PA security forces have done on behalf of the Israeli occupation army.
“The Palestinian Authority has achieved 100 percent success rate at security coordination with Israel,” Abbas said.
Abbas has also been leading a tenacious campaign against the right of return for Palestinian refugees.
Refugee rights are a key pillar of the BDS call.
