Post coup Egypt: reconciliation and aid an urgent priority

© Shafiq Morton

Call it a coup by any other name, but when a duly elected government gets deposed by the military, it’s a coup.

That’s the reality of Egypt today. One of North Africa’s most populous countries is in serious turmoil; this after Muslim Brotherhood leadership was deemed unsuitable for office after a mere 12 months in power.

Egypt’s sweet “Arab Spring” has certainly turned into a sour autumn. Hope and dignity have been replaced by despair and humiliation, and tolerance has been usurped by the brutality of the re-emerged Baltaji, former Mubarak-supporting thugs.

With TV stations and publications closed down, freedom of speech has shrivelled on the bough, and NGO’s – often the organs of the most oppressed – have been effectively silenced by jail sentences.

So how could Egypt, once a bastion of a new democratic beginning, retreat so quickly into the morass of state militarism? It’s a question many have asked since President Muhammad Morsi, admittedly a colourless – if not stubbornly naïve – figurehead found his sluggish hand of national conciliation and “Roadmap” slapped away by roaring crowds.

Morsi – who took power by a slender majority – is said to have faced an Egypt polarised by “political Islam”, and a more secular constituency comprising a wide range of traditional ideologies (such as neo-liberalism and Marxism) not prepared to accept any concept of an “Islamic state”.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s extremely poor performance in terms of being able to successfully accommodate other political parties and its sluggishness in squaring up to pressing economic and social challenges, are just some of the factors said to have created unprecedented historical public outcry against Morsi’s government.

Professor Tariq Ramadan, the internationally celebrated academic (who is a grand nephew of Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood) has been one of the sharpest critics of the Brotherhood, and of recent events.

Whilst slating the Brotherhood for stupefying incompetency, he also claims that Mubarak was not toppled in 2011 by the people, but by the military, who merely saw the writing on the wall.

According to Ramadan, the hopeful and courageous Egyptian masses – aspiring for genuine justice and freedom – were duped into thinking that they could enjoy a civilian democracy. In a piece entitled Coup d’état, Act II he writes that the Egyptian military merely faded into the shadows and patiently waited its turn.

What is historic, he says, is that Egypt experienced two military coups in the space of three years. According to him, the Egyptian army had not returned to politics for the simple reason it had never actually left politics.

He points at army head General Abdul Fattah Al-Sisi – ironically appointed by Morsi – as the obvious key player in the coup. US trained and known to Israeli intelligence, Ramadan alleges that he had been conniving all along with the US and Israel behind Morsi’s back.

Ramadan goes on to explain the position of the Salafist An-Nour party, which broke away from the Brotherhood camp and supported the generals. He says that An-Nour’s sponsorship by the Gulf States (who are firm US allies) puts it firmly into the US orbit, and makes it a victim of neo-colonial divide-and-rule policy.

Conspiracy or not, Egypt faces daunting challenges for whoever takes over the reins. Three years of political chaos, and decades of corruption, have brought the country to the brink of collapse. Poverty and food insecurity loom over the Nile like a Biblical locust plague.

According to Dr Hussen Oruch of the Turkish Humanitarian Relief Foundation, dropping living standards on the back of rising food costs over the past three years has meant that 18-20 million people are already in need of help. He told me that over 20% of Egyptians lived below the poverty level.

A recent article in the UK-based Guardian (6 May) featuring Galal Amin (economics professor at the American University in Cairo) and Samir Radwan (former Finance Minister after 2011) concurs with Dr Oruch’s views.

According to the Guardian report, 25% of Egyptians are below the poverty line with a further 23% hovering just above it. Radwan admits glumly that over 50% of the population is currently impoverished.

But added to that is retreating economic growth (3%), a 60% drop in foreign exchange reserves, the closure of factories, the shrinkage of personal savings of over 50% and the Egyptian pound losing 12% against the dollar. 

Even Egypt’s tourist industry, which accounts for 11% of its GDP, has taken a hammering. A travel industry report by the World Economic Forum rated it in March as the least safe of 140 tourist destinations, even putting it behind Pakistan, Yemen and Chad.

And if those challenges aren’t enough, Egypt’s restive and expectant youth – who comprise a quarter of the population of 90 million – enjoy an unemployment rate of 24%, with females as high as 49%.

This puts into stark focus the post coup bail-out packages – totalling 13.5 billion dollars ­ – which have been put on the table by the US, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. It’s a no-brainer that an economic and social implosion in Egypt would be catastrophic for regional stability.

Of course, there is the question as to the nature of the strings attached to the bail out. Will it be business as usual with Israel in the Sinai and a further re-inforcement of the Gaza blockade? Will Cairo be able to effect urgent social upliftment without corrupt officials draining the coffers? Will genuine democracy be allowed to return to Egypt?

Dr Hisham Hellyer, a Cairo-based political analyst, fills in critical detail when he says that against the background of the Brotherhood backlash, and potential dangers of sectarian extremism, Egypt’s new rulers must give clear and uncompromising signals. What Egypt needs right now, he says, is the creation of a truly pluralistic political arena with reconciliation being the most urgent national priority.

 

Why Israel? Bravely lifting the veils

Why Israel? Anatomy of Zionist apartheid -
a South African perspective.
Authors Suraya Dadoo and Firoz Osman.
MRN and Porcupine Press.

 

South Africa is a unique country in the mosaic of the Palestinian struggle. On the one side is the Muslim community, anti-Zionist Jews, the ANC government, COSATU, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign and the Palestinian solidarity movement.

On the other side is the pro-Zionist lobby, a lobby that hid behind the skirts of the apartheid government for 46 years, and that betrayed Jewish anti-apartheid activists whilst it benefited from years of sanctions busting with Israel.

But what makes South Africa truly unique is that it’s a place where the majority of its citizens instinctively understand the Palestinian dilemma. Indeed, Israeli apartheid resonates strongly with South Africans, many of whom were forced into Bantustans or Group Areas, and deprived of over 80% of their land.

And when we talk apartheid in Israel, we mean its definition according to a convention of the United Nations that was passed in 1973. This convention has since been re-inforced by the Rome Statutes of 2002. Further studies by bodies, such as our own Human Sciences Research Council and Human Rights Watch, have concluded that apartheid is practised in Israel .

Suraya Dadoo and Firoz Osman, the authors of the newly-released Why Israel? An anatomy of Zionist apartheid – a South African perspective, hail from a community that was directly affected by apartheid. Dadoo is a researcher at the Gauteng-based Media Review Network and Dr Osman is an executive member of the MRN.

Published by the MRN and Porcupine Press, Why Israel? is divided into 13 parts that deal with various aspects of the Palestinian question. It takes the reader through a systematic tour of the issues with a South African voice, although I would immediately venture that its appeal is universal.

Why Israel? is a thorough work. It is footnoted and its sources are clearly attributed; there’s a useful glossary, an index and plenty of maps and photos. Because of its academic proficiency I suspect that certain arch-Zionists are going to choke on their coffee as they leaf through its 600 pages.  

What they will discover is that Why Israel? exposes some harsh truths: that Zionism is a political, and not a religious discourse; that anti-Semitism is used to vilify anyone who criticises Israel;  that our diamonds, shipped to Tel Aviv, become blood diamonds; that policy is regulated through the bullying and intimidation of the media, and that Jews who speak out are viciously slandered and silenced.

Furthermore, Why Israel? will reveal  that Mossad has a web of international informers in every Jewish community, and that it hires a squad of hit-men to perform extra-judicial killings world-wide, and that the raft of laws that strangle Palestinian life only serves to privilege the Jewish. 

In spite of bulging with information, Why Israel? is an easy read and an invaluable reference for anyone wishing to get a fuller understanding  of the Palestinian situation. Why Israel? is well-designed and user-friendly, and pithy box quotes (relating to the text) are conveniently situated on right hand pages.

However, in trying to paint such a vast canvas, the authors have obviously had to make sacrifices in terms of content. It’s admittedly always a difficult choice what to leave in and what to leave out.

In Chapter 1, for example, I would have liked to have seen see more information on the historical origins of Zionism, and that the rabbis of Europe declared Zionism an apostasy when the idea was first mooted at the end of the 19^th century.

There should have been mention, I feel, that Zionism was not originally a Jewish discourse.  The famous aphorism of “a land without a people for a people without a land” was first uttered by Lord Shaftsbury, an English evangelist, in 1853.  

And William Hechler, an Anglican cleric, wrote The Restoration of the Jews to Palestine two years before Herzl penned his Der Judenstat.

The book also tackles the issue of Martyrdom Operations (or suicide bombings) of which I, admittedly, have always had reservations. Nevertheless, the authors do grab the nettle. Palestinian despair, after all, is driven by the fact that Palestinians do have to face the aggression of the world’s fourth most powerful military machine without a state, or even an army.

This is the measure of the disproportionism that Palestinians face daily, and the authors are right when they quote Dr Samah Jabr as saying that the Palestinian resistance (which is legitimate under international law) has never been fairly assessed.

All-in-all, Why Israel? is a brave book that fully exposes the activity of South African Zionists, who historically, have been the most avid – and the most unquestioning – supporters of Israel. But where Why Israel? really strikes home is in its comprehensiveness, and in this respect its authors have done a sterling job.

In their introduction, Dadoo and Osman write that the aim of their book is to “stimulate discussion, debate, and understanding” – that, I think, it will certainly achieve as the readers of Why Israel? lift the multiple veils of hasbara and disinformation that currently bedevil the Palestinian narrative.

Fasting through the ages: from rebirth to redemption

© Shafiq Morton

The Qur’an is briefly descriptive, but richly evocative, when it broaches the subject of fasting. In Surat ul-Baqarah (the Chapter of the Heifer) we are told to fast as others were prescribed to fast before us.

                                
This verse informs us why we fast – to guard our souls – and specifically, that fasting has a long human tradition. Having made this qualification, we are then told about the significance of Ramadan and how to fast.

Today, Islam is the only monotheistic religion that has institutionalised fasting as a pillar of faith. This it has done by sanctifying a whole lunar month, and telling the believer that the fast is a special worship, its true worth only known to the Creator.

But beyond that, little appears to be recorded historically about the human tradition of fasting. It is established, for example, that before the Revelation came down, the Prophet Muhammad (SAW) used to indulge in “tahannuth”, an annual retreat in a mountain cave above Makkah.

Those ancient Arabs who indulged in tahannuth exercised ascetism, but little is known about their actual practices. Fasting, however, would have been familiar to the Arabs via the Jewish tribes in the Hijaz.

The Jewish Halakkah, or Sacred Law, enjoys similarities to Shari’ah on certain questions of fasting. The Jewish Day of Atonement –  the 25-hour fast of Yom Kippur – used to occur on the 10^th of Muharram (the 10^th of Tishrei) and inspired a famous Hadith.

But where did the practice of fasting originate? The Qur’an, which informs us that fasting was a previously prescribed practice is silent – not wishing to distract the early Muslims with unnecessary detail. Yet it still remains a provocative question. Who started fasting?  

Research shows that almost every revealed religion on earth has utilised fasting. A rare exception is Zoroastrianism, whose origins go back to 2,000 BCE in Persia.

Aboriginal belief, which is the fitrah of human consciousness, uses fasting as a spiritual agent of re-birth. Aboriginal awareness of an afterlife, which is seen in cave drawings from Africa to America, marked a sudden burst of human consciousness over 50,000 years ago.

The question that scientists still struggle to answer today is what was the spark that set off this awareness? Parallels across these cultures seen in their symbolism of the afterlife – as observed by the author Graham Hancock – reveal a collective sub-consciousness.

Was this spark that set off early human spirituality an “Adamic moment” – the real “missing link?” There is no easy answer. Some scholars set prophetic history at about 15,000 years ago. So what about the gap?

The Jinn – those shadowy, fiery figures of a parallel dimension ­– had over 1,000 prophets well before Adam’s (as) creation. However, there are no records of divinely inspired humanoid messengers during that era, although there is overwhelming evidence that some divine consciousness did exist.

Hinduism, regarded as the world’s oldest religion (its actual origins are unknown), developed in the Indus region. It has a universal understanding of fasting, one that would be understood well by Muslims.

Hindu sources describe fasting as an austerity, a “tapas”, which involves the cessation of contact between the bodily senses and their sensory, or source objects. In this tradition, the deprivation of the ears, the eyes, the mouth, the tongue and the stomach allows the brain to focus on God.

But let’s get to the beginning of prophetic history, which is said to have begun in the Indus region when Adam (as) first set foot on Mt Serendib in Sri Lanka. The question is – did the father of modern mankind, Adam (as), fast? I would argue that he did.

For when he reached Makkah and started pleading with Allah, his mouth and his tongue would have been moist with prayer; his eyes would have been blinded with tears; his ears would have rung with words of imprecation, and his stomach would have been empty.

Indeed, Adam (as) was in the primordial state of the person fasting. Being a prophet, devotional perfection would have been his natural state. Us weaker mortals have to deprive our nafs, the cauldron of our desires, first.

Moderation – which  Islam propagates – is evidenced through the fasting of the Buddha. For after six years of zealous ascetism, his ribs “sticking out like the rafters of a hut” and his backbone touching his stomach, he realised he would die before he achieved realisation.

Indeed, it’s reported that only after the Buddha gave up his extreme ways did he finally experience his spiritual awakening.

We’ve spoken about fasting in the Judaic tradition. Fasting is mentioned in the Christian scripture over 30 times. The book of Jonah, for instance, talks about the fast of Nineveh – when prophet Yunus’ people made repentance.

Jesus, the great ascetic, fasted for 40-days in the Judean desert. It culminated in the Shaitan telling him to jump off a mountain to see if Allah would protect him, and Jesus retorting that it was Allah’s job to test him, not his (Jesus’) to test Allah.

Interestingly, the voluntary Christian fast of Lent – usually about 40 days prior to Easter – is said by some historians to have its origins in ancient Egyptian tradition. The temple priests, who had to fast as part of their training, would fast for 40 days before the festival of the god, Osiris.

Osiris, the husband of Isis, was killed by Seth, but in a cyclical realm would enjoy resurrection. The festival, said to celebrate the northern hemisphere spring in April, would culminate in a “baptism”, or rebirth, by the priests bathing in the Nile.

No offence is intended to Christianity. The point of our example is that for thousands of years, the practice of fasting has always meant – in some way or another – a sincere aspiration to a rebirth of the human spirit.

However, Ramadan – which has been bequeathed to mankind by our Creator’s most beloved, Muhammad (SAW) – is something very special indeed. For how many ancient communities could boast that they had a month whose beginning would bestow Mercy, whose middle would confer Redemption and whose end would promise Paradise?

 

Obama addresses Cape Town

Obama in action.

© Shafiq Morton

US President Barack Obama speaks on the same podium at the University of Cape Town that Senator Bobby Kennedy did in 1966, when he visited South Africa at the height of apartheid, making a speech on human rights that enraged the then Nationalist government of Hendrik Verwoed.

Previously in the day Obama had spent time with Nobel prize winner, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and visited Robben Island, an experience he described as "humbling".

Former President Nelson Mandela, was an inspiration not only to South Africa, but to the world, he said. Mandela was the ultimate testament to the process of peaceful change.

 

He told the audience that the South African anti-apartheid divestment campaign is what whetted his appetite for a political career. He emphasised the role that the youth of Africa, with 60% of it under the age of 35, had to play in its exciting future.

 

On the policy front he said that the US in Africa was moving from aid to a "partnership of equals". Africa was the rising continent with some of the fastest growing economies, and people were noticing this.

 

US policy would be backed up by three over-riding principles: opportunity, democracy and peace, this underlined by a focus on energy, eradicating preventable diseases and clean government. Corrupt government, he said, eroded democratic values and continental development.

 

He elicited a  sustained round of applause when he said that there could only be progress (in Africa) if governments served the people, and not the other way round.

 

Announcing the New Trade Africa Initiative, President Obama revealed that 7 billion US dollars would be invested (together with 9 billion from the private sector) in doubling the energy capacity of sub-Saharan Africa. He told the audience that the US would be "unapologetic" in lending "muscle" to those who were victims in the continent.

 

Obama also announced that next year there would be a summit held in Washington for sub-Saharan leaders, and for youthful continental leadership as well.

 

President Obama concluded that if one wanted to see the difference between tyranny and oppression, South Africa was the place to see it. "If any country has shown how the power of human beings can change destiny, here's the one," he said.

 

 

Madiba: through my lens

The great moment in history outside Victor Verster prison,
February 1990.

The actual annoucnement took everybody by surprise.

Shaikh Nazeem Mohamed reads a letter
 Madiba sent to the Muslim Judicial Council in 1989

                                                        The prison is near to the harbour.

 

 

                                                              Madiba's famous cell, home for over 20 years.

                                                             The morning after the release at
                                                                                   Bishop Tutu's house.

                                          The car that took Madiba from the prison. A Toyota Cressida.
                                                               No blue light convoys in the early days.

 

                                                    Masjid ul-Awwal, Cape Town, April 1994.

                                                        Former Justice Minister Dullah Omar (left)
                                                           and Shaikh Nazeem Mohamed in Awwal mosque,
                                                               first mosque established in South Africa 1794.

 

 

                                                        Sayyid Shaikh Muhammd al-'Alawi visits Robben Island.

                                                        Talking to local leaders, Bo Kaap.

                                                     Imam Amien Ahmed welcomes Madiba.

                                                           Greeting locals in Cape Town.

                                              Madiba is garlanded after talking to Muslim community
                                                                             in the Bo-Kaap, Cape Town.

                                                          Madiba leaves Awwal Mosque, April, 1994.



                                                              © Shafiq Morton  

The Obama question: his South African visit in focus

When President George W Bush II shuffled off centre stage, dragging his dangling participles and poor grammar behind him, he was a pathetic, crumpled figure. Even his customary Texas bravado was muted, and the contrived spring in his step was tired.

Historically the US’s worst president, he departed the Oval office in a trail of destruction. His legacy is indeed painful: the sinister but still unresolved conspiracy of 9/11, one of the greatest wars in modern times against an abstract noun called “terror” and the marginalisation of international law.

Then there was the matter of global financial meltdown due to his questionable financial policies. This led to market greed and speculation on a scale never witnessed before in human history. His administration’s massive tax breaks for the wealthy, which did not see a trickle down of wealth as he naively expected, created the US’s worst debt deficit in living memory.

But not only that; for under the watchful eye of his vice-president and string-puller Dick Cheney – a corporate vulture – he’d plundered Iraq, refused to sign the Kyoto protocol, devastated Afghanistan, destabilised Pakistan, ignored the Palestinians, hounded Iran, peddled Islamophobia and presented the discredited idea of a “clash of civilisations” as a fait accompli.

So it was no wonder that when Barack Hussein Obama was sworn in as a Democratic president in 2008 after nearly a decade of neo-con ignorance, imperious arrogance and darkness, there was hope in the air.

Here was a man who had a command of the English language and who appeared to understand the urgent issues at play. The US, via the Bush regime, had become one of the world’s most hated nations, particularly in the developing world and the Middle East.

The worst affected by global warming, the militarisation of international relations, neo-liberal economics and the plundering of natural resources by the major powers, it has always been their awareness that since 1967 US foreign policy has been dominated by Israeli interests.

Obama had two challenges facing him: firstly, the domestic situation and the economy, which was on the brink of a melt-down, and secondly, US foreign policy with regards to the “war on terror”, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Israel.

To be sure, Obama had an inbox from hell. But he did start out bravely, his address in Cairo giving the Muslim world hope. His undertakings to shut down Guantanamo Bay and to gradually withdraw from Afghanistan and Iraq (where millions of civilians have died) were also widely welcomed.

Unfortunately, the adage that the road to hell is paved with good intentions applies to Obama. He not only had to immediately make concessions to Zionists and conservatives in appointing his administration, but he had to deal with a legislature that was Republican, and destructively antagonistic towards him.

This is not to excuse Obama, but to portray more the reality of his office, compromised from the start, and hog-tied by reactionary Republicans – and a right-wing Tea Party constituency that tried to make the case that he was a closet Muslim.

However, his daunting presidential challenges aside, the reality on the ground for most of the communities affected by US policy, the direct delivery of Obama’s pre-office promises have been inadequate. These were people who needed relief and they are bitterly disappointed.

Guantanamo – that great moral wart – still remains open, drones still terrorise Pakistan, Israel still builds settlements with impunity, Israel still receives more US aid than Africa and Asia combined, the US still has to acknowledge the ICC, the US still has to lift the anachronistic Cuban embargo, carbon reduction is minimal and covert militarisation, particularly in Africa, continues.

This is what clouds President Obama’s scheduled visit to South Africa, certainly not helped by the DA-dominated Cape Town City Council slavishly awarding the US president – the only person to have been awarded a Nobel Peace prize for doing nothing – the freedom of the city.

These are just some of the issues that have galvanised a very broad spectrum of local civic society organisations from COSATU to the SACP to oppose Obama’s visit, the Muslim Lawyer’s Association going so far as to seek a criminal investigation against him based on the Stanford Report, the Rome Statutes and the Geneva convention.

For the South African government, Obama’s visit is a matter of development, economics and continental security. According to President Zuma, who addressed the media, the US is a major investor with 600 companies operating in the country. Zuma also added that 90% of SA products entered the US market duty-free.

According to economic commentators Obama’s second African visit – also to Senegal and Tanzania – is a belated effort to engage the continent against the background of Chinese dominance. Africa is a rising giant, and as one of the world’s most powerful industrial economies in spite of debt and recession, the US can’t afford to miss the boat.

 

Accused of wanting to combat “anti-Israel activity”: Ebrahim Rasool slams the Jerusalem Post

There is a huge difference between "anti-Israel"
and anti-Semitism.
© Shafiq Morton

Did Sam Sokol, Jewish world affairs and Diaspora reporter for the Jerusalem Post “SA ambassador, Ebrahim Rasool, assures action on anti-Israel activity” get his lines crossed? Or, was it calculated Zionist hasbara?

This is a question, to which only Sokol has the answer, and at the time of writing – a week after filing his story – he had not publicly clarified his position, and nor had his employers, the Jerusalem Post.

In his story (6 June, 2013) he had quoted the SA ambassador to Washington as saying that on completion of his diplomatic tour of duty in the US … “he (Rasool) would commit himself to… combating anti-Israel and anti-Semitic activity (as) a priority”.

These remarks were allegedly made at a breakfast hosted by the ambassador with the Islamic Society for North America (ISNA) and the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding (FFEU), a Jewish-Muslim interfaith group of 10-years standing.

The FFEU is headed by Rabbi Marc Schneier, the charismatic rabbi of the Manhattan synagogue in New York, and vice-president of the World Jewish Congress, an organisation that represents the interests of over 100 Jewish communities world-wide.

The FFEU, in conjunction with ISNA, had been hosting a dialogue on Capitol Hill between Jewish and Muslim representatives from southern hemisphere countries South Africa, New Zealand and Australia. Previous dialogues had been held with European and Latin American communities in 2009 and 2012.

The long-term goal of the FFEU, which has embarked upon a programme of “twinning” mosques and synagogues, is to facilitate a global movement of Jews and Muslims committed to communication, reconciliation and co-operation.

At the breakfast Rasool had re-iterated a theme of the FFEU – endorsed by ISNA president, Imam Mohamed Magid – of Jews and Muslims standing up for each other on matters of Islamophobia and anti-Semitism.

The ambassador had also observed that engagement between Muslims and Jews should be based on a rediscovery of the finest values of the Abrahamic tradition. The question was how those who valued peace, justice and mercy carried it over into this doctrinal space, one he said harked back to 1492 in Spain – a time when there had been productive Judeo-Islamic co-existence.

Using the term “human agency”, Rasool said contact should be based on this principle; a principle (of universal empathy) that could solve intractable problems unfettered by base instincts such as security, or who committed the first wrong.

An investigation by Al-Qalam has shown that nowhere in Rasool’s breakfast address did he speak about committing himself to combating “anti-Israel activities” as alleged by Sokol in the Jerusalem Post.

The mischief starts when Sokol’s second paragraph in his article suggestively switches focus by bracketing “anti-Zionist” with “anti-Semitic”, thus neatly associating anti-Semitism with “anti-Israel”.

The ink had hardly dried on the pages before the Jerusalem Post story started to circulate in South Africa. It was picked up in an e-mail by Muhammed Desai of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign.

Accusing Rasool of being a sell-out, and of being out of sync with Muslim and local political sentiment, Desai asserted that the central issue (in Palestine) was not about religion, but human rights.

He insinuated that Rasool did not sufficiently understand this, and cast aspersions upon the credibility of the participants. According to Desai, it was political struggle that brought people together, not faith alone.

Desai, in turn, was criticised by Rasool’s World for All Foundation for blithely accepting the Zionist-friendly, if not reactionary Jerusalem Post, as being a trustworthy source.

When asked by Al-Qalam if Desai had contacted him to verify his statements in the Jerusalem Post, Rasool said he had received no calls.

In an angry letter to Rabbi Schneier (of which Al-Qalam has seen a copy) Rasool vehemently denied the contents of the Jerusalem Post report, complaining that he’d been falsely accused of saying something that was not even discussed.

“…the report is a travesty. I cannot believe it is the intention of the FFEU to destroy the reputation of those Muslims who enter into dialogue with Jews by distorting a complex discussion on inter-faith dialogue into just another sound-byte support of Israel,” he said.

Rasool also objected to the politically-loaded term “moderate”being applied to Muslims, a quote attributed to Rabbi Schneier in Sokol’s report. He said he’d stressed at the breakfast that those choosing the path of non-violence and peace could be “militant”, and not “moderate”.

He’d also observed that no-one in South Africa who’d survived apartheid could ever be immune to the plight of the Palestinians. South Africans, he said, had too “keen a sense” of what it meant for a people to be dispossessed of their land, and rendered strange in a place they called home.

Rasool emphasised that the biggest South African lesson was that you could not fight racism with racism. In the same breath, the anti-dote to the suffering of Palestinians could not be anti-Semitism.

He said he did not warn against extremism in the Muslim community to support Israel, but to prevent the distortion of the Muslim soul – and also what was being done in his name as a Muslim.

In response to Rasool’s letter, Rabbi Schneier apologised for what he also called a “travesty”.

"We were as shocked and as angry as you are and we have made it clear that this news brief was totally false and inaccurate,” he said in a texted message.

Reports in publications such as the Washington Jewish Week and the Forward corroborate that Sokol's interpretation of Rasool’s remarks differ markedly from those portrayed in the other Jewish media.

The Forward, the US’s biggest Jewish media mouthpiece, quoted Rasool as saying that during the anti-apartheid struggle, South African Muslims and Jews had worked together motivated by a common humanity, but that since 1994, the Palestinian situation had dominated the discourse and divided the communities.

This point was observed too by South African Jewish representatives and Rabbi Schneier, who said that South African Muslims were very passionate about Israel, and that rapprochement in post-apartheid South Africa was one of their biggest challenges.