On Tuesday, top Hamas officials participated in commemorating the 10th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s death, alongside his family, focusing attention on the ongoing conflict in Gaza.
South Africa has expressed strong disapproval of Israel’s response to the unprecedented October 7 Hamas attacks, leading to a war with a high casualty count.
Mandela, who passed away at the age of 95 in 2013, dedicated himself to advocating for a Palestinian state as a primary international cause during his historic presidency as South Africa’s first black leader.
Among those honoring the anti-apartheid icon, Hamas members were present, laying a wreath alongside Palestinians during the Mandela family’s tribute at a sizable statue.
Mandela’s grandson, national assembly member Mandla Mandela, helped organise a two-day conference on the Palestinian-Israel conflict before the wreath-laying at the Union Buildings.
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Basem Naim, a former Hamas health minister in Gaza, and Khaled Qaddoumi, the militant group’s representative in Iran, were among Palestinians to visit for the conference and anniversary.
‘We were waiting to gain first-hand experience of the daily atrocities that are being carried out in Gaza,’ Mandla Mandela told national broadcaster SABC.
‘It was a real experience for them to be in South Africa and learn from our experience as we had to face one of the most brutal apartheid regimes on the continent and we were able to defeat it.’
He said his grandfather considered a Palestinian state ‘the great moral issue of our time’ and added: ‘We are carrying on where he left off.’
Part of the ruling African National Congress, Mandla Mandela played a role in supporting a recent parliamentary motion that called for the closure of the Israeli embassy and the suspension of diplomatic ties in protest of the war.
South Africa has also officially called on the International Criminal Court to investigate what President Cyril Ramaphosa has called Israel’s “war crimes” in Gaza.