Iran Press/ Africa: Trade unionist and activist, Khalifah Makgotlho told Iran Press that Quds Day this year has significance locally as it falls in April, when South Africans realize their liberation and mark Freedom Day.
“For us as South Africans, it is more important because of this Quds day, it happens around the times of us commemorating the Sharpeville Massacre, and also celebrating in the current month our Freedom Day.
“And having to recall the words of our former president, Nelson Mandela, who said we know too well that our liberation is incomplete until the liberation of the Palestinians is complete. So what is happening in Gaza now, it is very, very important for us. It is serving as a propellant for the death of the usurper state of Israel.”
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Protestors demanded that the United States, France, Germany, Australia, and other Western countries end the enabling of the Israeli genocide in Palestine. They also questioned the extent of the capability of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to effect real change on the ground in Gaza.
Since the court issued its ruling in favor of South Africa in January, Israel has continued with its massacres against Palestinians and is threatening to bomb Rafah where most Gazans have fled to seek refuge. In a further escalation, it targeted aid workers who are trying to alleviate the deadly starvation of Palestinians.
Mukhtar Adams, a protestor outside the US mission in Johannesburg highlighted the need to reshape the global order.
“The ICJ is an organization without any teeth. It can make a ruling but it cannot enforce the ruling. So what we need is for the governments, all these governments who are siding with the genocide, who are allowing Israel to commit this genocide, we need those governments to realize that they are on the wrong side of history, on the wrong side of what's right and what's wrong.
“So the government of Saudi Arabia, the government of United Arab Emirates, the governments of America, Bahrain, they all need to stand against what Israel is doing because it is clear. I mean, it goes to the United Nations, most of the nations vote for a ceasefire, but no one's enforcing it.
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“Saudi Arabia, if they start selling oil for any other currency other than dollars, basically they could bring this war to an end tomorrow. Right now, Israel takes $4 billion every year and gives that to Israel to commit genocide. And the only reason America has a blank check is because they can print the dollar out of thin air. So we need all the governments of the world to stand against the dollar, to start boycotting the dollar, to start looking for alternatives to the dollar, to start joining BRICS, and to start transacting in other currencies like maybe the Yuan, the Russian Ruble, and to find alternatives to the dollar. It's a very hegemonic, unfair world. America gets to overrule all the other countries of the world. It is unfair, it is not a just system. We need to stand against America because America is enabling this genocide.”
Zaakir Mayet, a founding leader of the Jabal al-Haq advocacy group told Iran Press that action is required urgently.
“Unfortunately, the law grinds very slowly. That wheel of justice grinds extremely slow but exceedingly fine. The other option and the more immediate option is to support the right of armed resistance as it is taking place right now in Palestine. It is the only form of resistance that has brought Israel to its knees. And we see that the equation has worked. When we look at 2006 Lebanon, it was the armed equation that prevented Israel from going on a rampage in Lebanon, and still today they are not capable of sufficiently attacking Lebanon due to the risk of an all-out war and their mutual destruction. Unfortunately, the Israelis have only understood this form of resistance and international law will take its course but it will take some time. The genocide needs to stop now.”
Protestors are also conscious of Israel’s continued flouting of countless United Nations Security Council resolutions and the impunity with which powers such as the United States allow it to behave.
Khalifah Makgotlho said; “If you go into the United Nations, you will see how many resolutions that they have gone against or their supporters have gone against and it has never depleted the support of the freedom of Palestinians. Instead, it has made people more determined to ensure that Israel goes down on its knees and eventually dies and the Palestinians are free.
“So what is just happening, it's like it has made people, and maybe in particular in South Africa, it has made us to go for more resolve. If you are away, now the South African government is in the process of ensuring that the next step of lodging a case in the ICC, not the ICJ, against America and Israel, is unfolding. So we will never give up.”
Underscoring the right of the resistance to defend itself and oppressed people around the world to resist, geopolitical analyst Zaakir Mayet highlighted the worrying escalation by the Zionist regime in not only striking civilians but also targeting Iran directly via its strike on the Iranian diplomatic mission in Syria.
“Israel has made it part of their war plan to target all hospitals in Gaza. They have targeted the Iranian consulate and its surrounding buildings, and this is an act of war on the part of the Israelis. Israel is completely off the mark. Israel has intentionally flouted international law, has failed to abide by United Nations Security Council resolutions, and the ICJ's recommendations, and it has been a belligerent state. The only answer is for force to be met with force, and this is the right of the Iranian people and the right of the Palestinian people to resist by any means necessary.”
Over 40 years after Imam Khomeini, the leader of the Islamic revolution in Iran declared International Quds Day, his vision of keeping alive the struggle of the Palestinians for justice is being recognized. The consciousness that the global annual protests bring unifies all humanity.
“Imam Khomeini noted that the most important thing was to unite around the issue of Palestine. It has become a barometer for truth and justice. No other cause unites people across all colors, creeds, religions, and locations, as the Palestinian cause has. As we have seen in the last six months, all the way from New York to Cape Town, from Cape Town to Tehran, from Tehran to Jakarta, there have been protests around the world. To abandon the Palestinians means to leave your humanity. That is why the late Imam Khomeini marked the final (Friday) day of the holy month of Ramadan, a spiritual month, to reaffirm everyone's connections, especially the monolithic faiths, to Jerusalem's holy sites. “It is the Beitul Makdis, the Temple Mount, as it is referred to by the Jewish people, Haram al-Sharif, by the Muslims, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, by those who follow the Christian religion. These are all very important sites, and this is a point of unification across the board. And those that believe in truth and justice also believe in the liberation of Palestine. And Imam Khomeini declared this to be a convergence point in a calendar”, said Mayet.
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