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South Africa Terrorists take refuge in South Africa.
by Jonathan Schanzer
05/28/2007
In early May, South Africa's intelligence minister, Ronnie Kasrils,
invited Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas member and prime minister of the
Palestinian National Authority, to lead a delegation to South Africa.
For good measure, Kasrils also demanded that the international community
lift the aid embargo imposed against Hamas since its electoral victory
in January 2006. Though sanctions were only to be lifted if Hamas
recognized Israel, Kasrils insisted that Haniyeh had gone "a long way to
meeting those requirements as we understand them."
This embrace of Hamas should come as no surprise. As long ago as June
2003, South Africa's deputy minister of foreign affairs, Aziz Pahad, met
with representatives of Hezbollah. After the meeting, the ministry
announced that "clear distinctions" must be made "between terrorism and
legitimate struggle for liberation."
Overtures to Hamas and Hezbollah are indicative of Pretoria's utter
indifference to the threat of radical Islamic ideologies and violence.
The worst consequence of this blindness may be the creation of a safe
haven for terrorists in South Africa itself.
According to one reported U.S. intelligence estimate, al Qaeda leaders
are operating throughout South Africa. Other reports indicate that
terrorists are exploiting the country's banking system, and that South
African passports are finding their way to al Qaeda operatives
worldwide.
It is only natural, then, that South African jihadists are popping up in
terrorist hotspots. In July 2004, Pakistani police arrested two South
Africans--Feroz Ibrahim and Zubair Ismail--along with Khalfan Ghailani,
who was on the FBI's most wanted list for his role in the 1998 embassy
bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. Subsequent investigations have
revealed that the pair was plotting to attack the Johannesburg Stock
Exchange, the parliament complex in Pretoria, and several other
high-profile targets in South Africa.
Another South African, Haroon Aswat, was tied to the July 7, 2005,
London mass transit bombings. After the attacks, Zambian officials
detained Aswat, who reportedly had exchanged a spate of phone calls with
each of the four suicide bombers before they carried out their deadly
attacks. Further research reveals that in the 1990s, Aswat was an
assistant to London-based Abu Hamza al-Masri, a one-eyed, one-handed
terrorist ideologue tied to al Qaeda groups in Yemen and Algeria. Aswat
worked with al-Masri at the radical Finsbury Park Mosque, where a number
of other terrorists received their training, including shoe bomber
Richard Reid.
More recently, in January 2007, the U.S. Treasury named two South
African cousins--Junaid Dockrat and Farhad Dockrat--Specially Designated
Global Terrorists for their support to al Qaeda and the Taliban. Farhad,
who had been detained in Gambia for suspected terrorist activity in
2005, was identified as having provided nearly $63,000 to al-Akhtar
Trust, a charity that was designated in 2003 for providing support to al
Qaeda. Junaid was responsible for raising $120,000 for Hazma Rabia, the
al Qaeda operations chief killed in Pakistan by the U.S. military in
2005.
After freezing the Dokrats out of the U.S. financial system, Treasury
submitted their names to the Sanctions Committee on al Qaeda and the
Taliban for designation by the United Nations Security Council. To the
chagrin of Washington, rather than pursuing these terrorists, South
Africa's foreign affairs minister, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, used his
country's new seat on the Security Council to put a hold on the U.N.
designations. Thus, while American sanctions might freeze any of the
Dockrats' assets that reach U.S. banks (the likelihood of that is now
extremely low), the terrorist-funding cousins continue to conduct
business in South Africa--and everywhere else in the world except
America--with impunity, all the while complaining about how the United
States has arbitrarily accused them of funding terrorism.
Pretoria appears to have cast its lot with the two terror suspects,
rather than the United States. Aziz Pahad voiced concerns about the
designation, claiming that the rights of South Africans need to be
defended. Pahad and other officials are asking for more information,
which is odd, considering a South African Sunday Times report that
discussions about the Dockrats has been ongoing between Washington and
Pretoria for almost a year.
One cannot say that South Africa is hamstrung by a sizable or
influential Muslim population--as is, for instance, France. Whereas some
10 percent of the French population are estimated to be adherents to the
Islamic faith, with increasing sway over the Quay d'Orsay (although the
election of Nicolas Sarkozy may change this), the Muslim population in
South Africa is only about 600,000 out of a population of 44 million, or
1.5 percent.
Even South African Muslim leaders admit there is a problem in their
community. As activist Naeem Jeenah writes on his website, "We do have
people in our community who are sympathetic to al Qaeda and the Taliban;
we do have people in our community who hold the same ideologies as those
groups."
Indeed, the problem is more systemic. Pretoria and Washington simply do
not see eye to eye on virtually any of the critical international
security challenges we face today. They have clashed over Iranian nukes
(South Africa maintains friendly ties with Iran), the war on terror
(South Africa does not agree with the U.S. definition of terrorism),
U.N. reform (South Africa appears to be uninterested), and the
Arab-Israeli conflict (Pretoria blames Israel).
Some of these policies can be traced to South Africa's identification
with the downtrodden. Its population remembers apartheid, and seeks to
redress social injustice. There is a deep distrust of the United States,
in light of the fact that the State Department labeled the African
National Congress (ANC) a terrorist group until the organization was
legalized and became a prominent political party in 1990. The State
Department's recent charm offensive through public diplomacy has done
little to erase that chapter in U.S. history--even though the ANC was
unquestionably involved in terrorist acts and had long-standing ties to
the terrorist Palestine Liberation Organization, and Nelson Mandela
embraced both Yasser Arafat and Muammar Qaddafi as loyal friends and
supporters of the ANC.
Given this history, there is a deep distrust of America's Middle East
policy, particularly its unwavering support for Israel. When former
President Jimmy Carter claims in his latest book that Israel
"perpetrates even worse instances of apartness, or apartheid, than we
witnessed in South Africa," South Africans sit up and take notice.
South Africa's quest for social justice notwithstanding, a terrorist
threat looms inside the country. What has been revealed in the press and
in U.S. government actions is likely just the tip of the iceberg. And
Pretoria further supports terror by reaching out to murderous groups in
the Middle East. As a result, Washington must keep an eye on one more
potential source of danger: South Afristan.
Jonathan Schanzer, a former Treasury intelligence analyst, is director
of policy for the Jewish Policy Center, and author of Al-Qaeda's Armies:
Middle East Affiliate Groups and the Next Generation of Terror. |
