South Africa has registered a strong protest over the escalation of violence between Israel and Palestine territories, to Israeli Ambassador Arthur Lenk. On Wednesday, Lenk was summoned to the South African Foreign Ministry for a meeting with South Africa’s Deputy Foreign Minister Nomaindia Mfeketo, in the absence of Foreign Minister Mashabane who is in Brazil for the 6th BRICS Summit. The death toll in Israel’s assault on Gaza has passed 216, including the four boys killed while playing on a beach on Wednesday. One Israeli civilian has been killed by mortar fire close to the Gaza border. Pretoria has said it “strongly opposes any threat of ground invasion and urged Israel to refrain from making utterances that may worsen the situation”. International media coverage of the current Gaza violence has also come under intense scrutiny. A 45000-strong online petition by a pro-Palestine group, also signed by leading thinkers like Noam Chomsky, John Pilger and many others strongly criticized the coverage of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) alleging a pro-Israel bias in their reporting. The petition said it would “like to remind the BBC that Gaza is under Israeli occupation and siege and that Israel is bombing a refugee population”. The South African government also called on Israel to immediately cease its air strikes into the Gaza Strip, allow safe and free passage of civilians and make it possible for humanitarian organisations to work on alleviating the suffering of victims of the violence.
Posted on: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 03:45:47 +0000
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