[R-G] South African Dock Workers Won't Unload Israeli Goods

[Richard Menec]

South African Dock Workers Won't Unload Israeli Goods

Associated Press February 4, 2009

<http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/02/04/world/AP-AF-South-Africa-Israel.html?_r=1>

JOHANNESBURG

South African dock workers won't unload ships carrying goods from Israel in 
solidarity with the Palestinians, a union leader said Wednesday.

Randall Howard, general secretary of the South African Transport and Allied 
Workers Union, said it appeared a ship carrying goods from Israel was 
nearing Durban's port. If once the ship docks its cargo is determined to be 
Israeli, he said, union workers won't unload it.

"We will make that contribution," he said. "The historic and heroic struggle 
of the Palestinian people for self-determination ... is a struggle that 
SATAWU supports."

Last year, South African dock and freight workers refused to unload a ship 
carrying weapons for Zimbabwe to protest Zimbabwean President Robert 
Mugabe's rule of the neighboring country. In the case of Israeli goods, 
Howard said, it did not matter whether they were weapons of vegetables.

"If it's an Israeli product, we're going to boycott it, plain and simple," 
he said.

In Israel, Foreign Minister spokesman Yigal Palmor said: "If these people 
think that by refusing to unload shipments from Israel they are promoting 
peace they should go back to school because they have misread the situation 
in the Middle East big time."

Israel's three-week military offensive against Gaza, which killed hundreds 
of civilians before ending last month, sparked protests in South Africa. 
Israel says the operation was aimed at halting Hamas rocket fire from Gaza.

Howard, decrying Palestinian as well as Israeli violence, says Israeli 
attacks were "extremely disproportionate."

Strong South Africa-Israel ties cultivated by the white government in the 
apartheid era have been maintained since the onset of majority rule. South 
Africa also has a close relationship with Palestinians, thanks to long- 
standing connections between the governing African National Congress and the 
Palestinian Liberation Organization.

------

Associated Press Writer Aron Heller in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

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