In November 2024, the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) published a report revealing South Africa’s genocide case at the International Court of Justice against Israel is part of a strategy by Iran, Qatar, Hamas, and Hezbollah, to undermine Israel using South Africa’s social justice legacy as a cover.
Despite the enormous implications of the report’s findings, almost all mainstream media ignored the story.
HonestReporting’s Josh Buchalter spoke with ISGAP Executive Director, Dr. Charles Asher Small, to hear about the report and its implications.
(The text of the interview below has been edited for brevity.)
HonestReporting: The Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy has just published a report that isn’t getting the media coverage it deserves. The focus is South Africa’s ANC government and its dangerous alliances with Iran, Qatar and Hamas.
Today I’m very pleased to have the opportunity to speak with Dr. Charles Small, Executive Director of the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy, in order to unpack the key points of the research.
Welcome, Dr. Small. Thank you for joining us.
Charles Asher Small: Thanks, I’m honored to be with you.
HR: So let’s get straight into the questions. Can you summarize the key findings of the report that link South Africa’s ICJ case against Israel to external pressures from Iran?
CAS: So one key point that’s very important is that the ANC, the African National Congress, had a massive debt. They were in serious financial trouble to the point where some were questioning whether they’d be able to run effectively in the last election. And suddenly their debt was mysteriously paid off. Money came in from outside sources and the ANC has not been transparent about where the funds came from.
At the same time, there is Foreign Minister [Naledi] Pandor, who is quite extreme when it comes to Israel. She has sided with Islamist terrorists and has a large following with radical elements in Cape Town and other parts of South Africa. Pandor went on a grand tour of Iran and visited Qatar for high-level meetings.
And following those meetings, a mere few weeks after the pogroms of October 7th, a high-level delegation from Hamas came to South Africa at her invitation, and the red carpet was rolled out by the African National Congress for the terrorist organization’s leaders.
Soon after that, the African National Congress took on this International Criminal Court case against Israel. When the African National Congress, the inheritors of the great struggle of Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, and Oliver Tambo, accused Israel of being an apartheid state, it had a definite impact around the world.
But what we’ve done in our report is unpack these unholy alliances that the ANC has forged with radical anti-democratic Islamist entities that call for the destruction of democracy, the annihilation of Israel, and the murder of Jewish people – as well as the subjugation of women and other minorities.
These are values that are antithetical to democracy and to what the African National Congress has stood for for nearly a century. It’s a shame that the current corrupt leaders have sold out the struggle against apartheid to anti-democratic antisemites.
And we have to remember the ideologies that hold sway in Qatar and Iran are based on Nazism and European antisemitism. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which laid the groundwork for the extermination of the Jewish people by the Nazis, was then fused with a perversion of Islam that is the ideological foundation of the Muslim Brotherhood and rulers of Qatar who have an alliance with the Islamist movement.
The fact that today’s African National Congress, descendants of those who were colonized by Afrikaners who were ideologically linked to Nazi ideology, are in bed with people espousing an ideology based on European antisemitism and Nazism is astounding.
Relatedly, it’s worth noting that Yusuf Qaradawi, the spiritual head of the Muslim Brotherhood, preached that the true believer, the true Muslim, is obligated to complete the work of Hitler. These are the people that Pandora and the African National Congress are linked up with today.
HR: So it was a direct exchange, where money was given to the South African government in return for the promotion of Iranian and Qatari interests.
CAS: Yes, this is what the research shows. We also found that the PFLP provided some legal counsel to the African National Congress and to the South African delegation at The Hague. So we have Palestinians connected to the PFLP, a terror-designated organization, helping push forward the case in the courts.
And there’s more. The United States of America has sanctioned certain Hamas operatives. One of these terrorists was Bassam Naim, who played a key role in forging relations with the African National Congress. He was very much involved in The Hague’s criminal trial against Israel. More recently, Naim was sanctioned again – by the Biden Administration. These are the African National Congress’s bedfellows.
HR: Is this the most shocking discovery or is there an under-reported detail from the report you’d like to speak about that was the biggest finding for you?
CAS: So I think the biggest findings are the financial connections that South Africa, that the African National Congress, has with the Iranian regime.
I was the chairperson of the African National Congress Solidarity Committee of Canada when I was a youngster in the 1980s and 90s. I went to South Africa to stand with the people against a racist, Nazi-inspired regime as they fought for democracy and justice.
To see the leaders of the ANC today accusing the Jewish people of apartheid while they take money from some of the most nefarious racists in the world is shocking – as well as criminal.
HR: In terms of the research, how exactly is it a game changer when it comes to trying to understand the ICJ case and South Africa’s motives?
CAS: The game changer is that democratic countries will hopefully start to understand that this [ICJ case] is part of the war against the Jewish people that is being led by the Muslim Brotherhood through Qatar and the regime in Iran.
To see South Africa drift into the arms of Iran and Russia is a strategic threat, both to the democratic principles of South African society and the wider international community of democratic nations.
Elie Wiesel, who is the founding president of the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy, ISGAP, always taught us that antisemitism is not a parochial problem for the Jewish people or for Israel. That even though antisemitism starts with the Jewish people, it never ends with the Jewish people.
This trafficking in antisemitism is a threat to democracies and people of goodwill around the world. Because once this hatred is unleashed, it knows no boundaries, and we have seen it used to attack other people – minorities, national groups, people of gendered identities. This is an affront to human decency.
HR: Thank you for sharing those powerful thoughts. If you could distill the report’s message into one sentence, what would it be?
CAS: The ICJ court case is part of an international effort to weaken Israel, to isolate the country from Western democratic societies, and to ultimately destroy it. The goal is also to use the case to increase antisemitism around the world, as a way to weaken democratic countries.
HR: So what would you say to those who claim that South Africa’s actions are rooted in a genuine fight against apartheid and an authentic concern for human rights rather than political or financial motivations?
CAS: I think they should read the report because we lay out what the motivations truly are. And I think people have to remember that if Israel is an apartheid state, as the antisemites and Israel haters claim, it would be a crime against humanity. Israel would then be an entity that had to be dismantled.
But this isn’t the case. What we’re seeing with the ICJ case is nothing less than a war being conducted against the Jewish people. Indeed, this apartheid libel is being led by the Muslim Brotherhood, the Iranian Mullahs, and their proxies – such as Hamas and Hezbollah. They claim that Israel is an illegitimate occupying entity, an apartheid society that has to be removed.
But take a look at the countries that border Israel. Do we see anything resembling a democracy in the neighborhood where Israel is located? Do we see vibrant societies where men, women, and minorities are celebrated? Do we see universities developing cures for diseases and teaching philosophy and the humanities? Do we see an explosion of music and art?
Or do we see societies where music is actually illegal? Places where women cannot go out in public unaccompanied by a man? Places where women cannot get an education? In Afghanistan and Gaza, women are not even allowed to speak in public.
Yet Israel’s detractors, funded by the Muslim Brotherhood in Qatar and Iran, want to destroy the only democracy in the Middle East – a vibrant place with thriving universities and civil society that is a catalyst for creativity and ingenuity in science and technology.
And for this sort of canard to start gaining traction in some of the finest universities of the Western world demonstrates the enormous challenge posed by antisemitism.
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Image credits: Reuters, NICK GAMMON/AFP via Getty Images, United Nations Photo via Flickr
