A liberal zionist conference has been organised in South Africa on 18-20 September 2024, called “African Global Dialogue: Narrative Conditions Towards Peace in the Middle East” where high-profile Zionist academics from around the world have been confirmed as speakers. The only pro-Palestine voices who will be there are piecemeal speakers who espouse such positions as condemning Hamas, lamenting the resistance and jeering at BDS. The framing is designed to manufacture consent, with the tag-line “Narrative Conditions Towards Peace in the Middle East”.
Speakers will include historian Benny Morris, lawyer Eli Salzberger and Salam Fayyad (Former Palestine Authority Prime Minister and long-standing International Monetary Fund economist), and other moderate voices. Also on the programme are Cameroonian social theorist Achille Mbembe and post-Marxist French philosopher Etienne Balibar.
Why it’s a problem:
South Africa’s Constitution Hill in central Johannesburg was chosen as a destination to lend the event credibility, given the country’s defeat of Apartheid and its government’s role in calling out genocide at teh International Court of Justice.
The goal of the event is to disguise the overwhelming oppressin of Palestinians by weaving new narratives about “the conflict”. As Israel prepares for a full takeover of Palestinian territories, a formal narrative to appease the international community is needed to soften the edges of the genocide.
The event will apparently be live-streamed by CNN and by a major South African broadcaster, eNCA (owned by a firm, HCI, whose leader is a strong critic of government’s pro-Palestine bias). The event also doubles up as a networking opportunity for billionaires, ambassadors, intellectuals and policymakers, offering one-on-one meetings.
Website and Facebook page:
Original concept note (May 2024)
By: New South Institute (NSI)
Narrative Conditions Towards Peace in the Middle East
An African Global Dialogue
Background
Since the physical assault on Israel on the 7th of October and the subsequent Israeli war with Hamas in Gaza, the public discourse on Israel/Palestine has radicalised in crude and violent ways. The protracted occupation of the West Bank has come to resemble an annexation, calling into question the conditions for a just resolution of the conflict. Right-wing extremism and messianism in Israel, moreover, threatens the fabric of democracy, the rule of law, and puts Israel in existential danger. At the same time, many Israelis, including those who are deeply critical of the current Israeli government, find difficulty being heard in the public domain unless they are willing to reject the right of the Jewish state to exist at all. Palestinian politics, especially since the rise of Hamas, entertains fascist strategies and messianic fantasies. The atrocities committed by Hamas are symptomatic of a profound malaise. What has been lost on all sides is an appreciation of nuance and complexity and, in turn, the search for constructive ways out of the current dead-end.
Informed by the idea that political narratives, especially about history, concepts, friends and enemies, matter, we seek critically to engage current political framings, with a view to opening a discursive space about Israel/Palestine and the region that is conducive to more positive engagement. In South Africa, the term that framed parts of the anti-Apartheid struggle and that provided the ideological ground for the negotiated settlement was the simple: “South Africa belongs to all who live in it’ from the 1955 Freedom Charter. Are there formulations that are specific to the Israel-Palestine conflict that might take seriously a commitment to freedom and dignity for Palestinians and Israelis?
As the war continues, with increasingly catastrophic consequences for Palestinian civilians and growing danger for the hostages held by Hamas, so does the polarisation of the public discourse – which only hinders attempts to break out of the zero-sum logic of conflict and destruction, and the increasingly wide gulf between friend and enemy.
Objectives
To create a space for conversation, thought and reflection, we are arranging a conference in South Africa with the following objectives:
· To interrupt extreme and exclusionary narratives about Israel/Palestine which are becoming entrenched in South Africa and globally
· To validate and encourage conversations – a robust but respectful exchange of diverse views and perspectives about the conflict, including those of Israelis and Jews
· To explore constructive and inclusive paths forward that promote peace and security, and the freedom and dignity of Israelis and Palestinians
Approach
To further these objectives, we will bring together prominent and influential people from across the world, including scholars and political and civil society leaders, for a series of thoughtful and sometimes difficult conversations.
In the spirit of seeking narrative conditions for freedom and dignity, we will host dialogues on understanding the current global disorder, the war in Gaza and International Humanitarian Law, Gender, War and Feminism, Apartheid and settler colonialism, Zionisms, Messianism and Post-Zionism, Developments in Palestinian politics and on paths to peace.
Through hosting these conversations in Johannesburg, we intend to make use of South Africa’s current international profile in relation to the situation in Gaza, the references to South Africa in current political discourses (use of the Apartheid metaphor to describe Israel, for example), as well as the relative success of the negotiated settlement in the 1990’s.
· In September 2024, we will bring together to Johannesburg some of the leading scholars on the Middle East, key figures involved in various peace initiatives, thought leaders and outstanding journalists to reflect, and safely debate difficult and contested issues. We will provide opportunities via radio and TV and live, face-to-face events, for people to speak directly with those involved, to ask questions, and to share ideas.
· Closed sessions will be used to introduce journalists, public personalities and thought leaders (influencers) to experts to discuss and debate controversial issues or even just to learn more about the details of historical and current events. We will make a special effort to attract media and influencers from across Africa and the New South.
When: 18-20 September 2024
Where: Constitutional Hill, Johannesburg, South Africa
Hosting the event in the space of the Constitutional Court carries a special resonance in the face of the ICJ case. It invokes a place where different views are powerfully yet peacefully argued and resolved. It also serves to remind participants and observers of South Africa’s negotiated, democratic settlement. While parts of the court are public, we will use interior rooms and studios where access will be carefully secured.
Format: In person sessions with experts in moderated discussions, convened by a high profile personality; not an academic format. Small, invited audiences for each session, consisting of thought leaders and journalists from South Africa, other parts of Africa and the New South. All sessions broadcast online and publicly, with opportunities for people to phone in and/ to send questions.
Private meetings between stakeholders.
Reference Group: The African Global Dialogues is coordinated through a reference group, including Prof Ivor Chipkin (Director, NSI), Rabbi Gideon Pogrund, Dr Maxine Jaffit, Mr Derek Spitz (Barrister, London), Dr Tali Nates (Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre) Dr David Fine (McKinsey), Judge David Unterhalter (Justice of the High Court, South Africa), and Prof Jelena Vidojević (NSI).
Speakers:
Panellists:
Achille Mbembe (WISER)
Adebayo Olukoshi (WITS)
Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib (Atlantic Council)
Ayşe Zarakol (University of Cambridge)
Benny Morris (Ben Gurion University)
Chile Eboe-Osuji (The Former President of the International Criminal Court)
Colin Shindler (University of Cambridge)
David Hirsch (Goldsmiths)
Eli Salzberger
Etienne Balibar (Philosopher)
Eugene Rogan (Oxford University)
Fania Oz-Salzberger (University of Haifa)
Frances Raday (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Hadil Al-Ashwal (MENA Gender Equality Initiative)
Ivor Chipkin (New South Institute)
Jie-Hyun Lim (Sogang University)
Marco Sassòli (University of Geneva)
Miloš Hrnjaz (University of Belgrade)
Mira Erlich-Ginor (Psychoanalyst)
Radmila Nakarada (New South Institute)
Salam Fayyad (Former Prime Minister, PA)
Yuval Shany (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Moderators:
Ayşe Zarakol (University of Cambridge)
Colin Shindler (University of Cambridge)
Eli Salzberger
Ivor Chipkin (New South Institute)
Mira Erlich-Ginor (Psychoanalyst)
Program:
Day 1:
Opening by Ivor Chipkin (16.00 PM)
Constitutional Hill Tour (16.15 PM)
Panel Session 1: Understanding global (dis)order (17.00 PM)
Moderator: Ivor Chipkin
Panellists: Ayşe Zarakol, Etienne Balibar, Adebayo Olukoshi
Day 2:
Panel Session 2: Revisiting the past: apartheid and settler colonialism (9.30 AM)
Moderator: Ayşe Zarakol
Panellists: Benny Morris, Eugene Rogan, Ivor Chipkin, Achille Mbembe
Break (11.00 AM)
Panel Session 3: Zionism and post-Zionism in Israel and the Palestinian politics (11.15 AM)
Moderator: Colin Shindler
Panellists: Fania Oz-Salzberger, Salam Fayyad, Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, David Hirsch
Lunch (12.45 PM)
Panel Session 4: Shattered humanity: cruelty and dehumanisation in conflict zones
Moderator: Mira Erlich-Ginor
Panellists: Frances Raday, Hadil Al-Ashwal, Radmila Nakarada, Jie-Hyun Lim
Break (15.30 PM)
Panel Session 5: The war in Gaza and International Humanitarian Law (15.45 PM)
Moderator: Eli Salzberger
Panellists: Miloš Hrnjaz, Yuval Shany, Marco Sassòli, Chile Eboe-Osuji
Day 3:
09.30 – 11.30 Panel session 6: The South African Government of National Unity: reimagining South Africa’s role in the time of multipolarity (to be confirmed)
Other potential guests (not confirmed)
Academics and public intellectuals
1. Elizabeth Sidiropolous
2. Philani Mthembu
3. Andries Du Toit
4. Alan Hirsch
5. Adam Mendelsohn
6. Gideon Pogrund
7. Zeblon Vilakazi
8. Edgar Pieterse
9. Morris Mthombeni
10. Imraan Valodia
11. Sakhela Buhlungu
12. Saths Cooper
13. Wim de Villiers
14. Mpilo Cele
15. Ray Hartley
16. Greg Mills
17. Palesa Morudu
18. Mukoni Ratshitanga
19. Dennis Davis
20. David Unterhalter
21. Martha Ngoye
22. Viv Anstey
23. Barbara Buntman
24. Shmuel Erlich
25. Frans Cronje
26. Phumi Mashego
27. Rina Brumberg
28. Kelly Phelps
29. Glynis Breytenbach
Government
1. Kuben Naidoo
2. Welcome Siphamandla ZONDI
3. Yacoob Abba Omar
4. Lebohang Liepollo PHEKO
5. Nikiwe Bikitsha
Ambassadors
1. HE Ms M B Monze
2. Reuben E. Brigety
3. HE Mr A Peschke
4. M C Ukason
5. HE Mr M K Abdu
6. Hachem El Moummy
7. African Union-
8. HE Mr V K Nghiwete
9. Goran Gvozdenovic
10. HE Mr Ilya Igorevich Rogachev
Business
1. Stephan Malherbe
2. Mcebisi Jonas
3. Adrian Enthoven
4. Sim Tshabalala
5. Martin Kingston
6. Jonathan Proctor
7. Mary Vilakazi
8. Lisa Klein
Media (local and international)
1. Ferial Haffajee
2. Adriaan Basson
3. Jacana Media
4. Xoli Mngambi
5. Aldrin Sampear
6. Naledi Moleo
7. Heidi Giokos
8. Thembekile Mrototo
9. Carol Paton
10. Hilary Joffe
11. Tim Cohen
12. Branko Brkic
13. Peta Krost
14. Peter Fabricius
15. Karyn Maughan
16. Nomsa Maseko
17. Fabienne Pompey
18. David McKenzie
19. Rachel Savage
20. Fahmida Miller
Civil society
1. Mandla Nkomfe
2. Tali Nates
3. David Lewis
ConHill Trustees
Robbie Brozin
Others
1. Rumbidzai Masango
2. Carly Maisel
3. Lisa Kropman
4. Le Roux van der Westhuizen
5. Clive Kabatznik
6. Barbara Kabatznik
7. Maxine Jaffit
8. David Jaffit
9. Lawrence Jackson
10. Raoul Miller
11. Larry Welcher
12. Philip Kirsh
13. Wendy Appelbaum
14. Hylton Appelbaum
15. Lord Peter Hain
16. Ismail Momoniat
17. Claude Braud
18. Gareth Cliff
Panellists
1. Ayşe Zarakol
2. Adebayo Olukoshi
3. Pankaj Mishra
4. William Gumede
5. Benny Morris
6. Eugene Rogan
7. Achille Mbembe
8. Fania Oz-Salzberger
9. Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib
10. David Hirsch
11. Mira Erlich-Ginor
12. Hadil Al-Ashwal
13. Miloš Hrnjaz
14. Chile Eboe-Osuji
15. Marco Sassòli
16. Ronald Lamola
17. Emma Powell
18. Gayton McKenzie
19. Songezo Zibi
20. Mmusi Maimane
21. Nicole Fritz
22. Eli Salzberger
Staffs
1. Ivor Chipkin
2. Jelena Vidojevic
3. Delani Majola
4. Revati Baboolal
5. Bridget van Oerle
6. Alison Solomon
Speaker Notes (by Ivor Chipkin)
Dear participants,
I have developed some questions for discussion in your respective panels. As I mentioned in the invitation, this is not a traditional conference where you are asked to present a paper. Nonetheless, it will be helpful for the convenors to have a good idea of what your perspective is on the topic. In this regard, I ask you please to develop a short memorandum, which can be shared with the convenor and with other participants. It will help the convenor generate a meaningful discussion. We might later ask you to develop it into a fuller paper for publication in a special edition or a book. The memo should not be longer than 3-4 pages.
The purpose of the event is to move discussion in South Africa and further afield away from the Hollywood-like caricatures that reduces the conflict to Nazi Zionists oppressing Palestinians or Fanatical Islamist/Arabs resisting the only democracy in the Middle East. We are not looking for nuance or complexity for its own sake – though this is valuable too – but because these binaries reduce each party to one-dimensional figures and foreclose on opportunities for political mutual recognition, whatever the ultimate form is.
Without suggesting that South Africa’s history or experience is a model for the situation in Israel/Palestine – my own view is that they are very different situations – there is an aspect of the South African experience that is, nonetheless, significant. Discursively and politically, the liberation movement in South Africa and the Nationalist Party did not commit atrocities against each other as a matter of will. Atrocities did happen, especially during the political transition and the civil war that broke out in some parts of the country, but atrocities were the exception.
Atrocities, as Etienne Balibar has argued, are not consequences simply of individual malice or deviance. They are rooted in political ideologies that dehumanise the opponents. In Israel/Palestine atrocity has become the norm of politics. It suggests, a deep malaise in political tendencies in Israel and amongst Palestinians. This fundamental crisis of humanism must be addressed as a condition for meaningful engagement in the region. Interrupting and ending the cycle of atrocities in Israel/Palestine is thus a bold, subversive, and radical endeavour.
This event is the beginning, hopefully, of ongoing discussions.
We would like to bring attention to the event and encourage a global audience to participate online. If you are comfortable, would you mind sharing some promotional material for the event, including the link to the www.africanglobaldialogue.org website in your networks?
Below are some questions for each panel:
· Understanding the Global (dis)order.
What political narratives are at work in the world today, especially in the context of the war in Russia/Ukraine and in the Middle East? What political concepts do they draw on? How do they imagine their opponents or enemies? How do they imagine a settlement or the conditions of peace? Other than destruction, how do they accommodate their enemies?
· Revisiting the Past: apartheid and settler colonialism.
The framing of Israel as a settler colonial power resembling more and more an Apartheid state is a recurrent feature of ‘anti-Zionist’ politics. It is also a theme of much academic writing. What is meant by these terms in the context of Israel? What is their provenance? Do they accurately speak to the historical and political record? Are there alternatives perspectives? Are these terms necessarily associated with determinate political outcomes?
· Zionism and Post-Zionism in Israel and the Palestinian politics.
How important is Zionism in the self-identity of Israeli political actors? What are the dominant expressions of Zionism in Israel today and how have they changed over time? Is Israel a “Zionist entity”? How have different Israeli governments imagined Palestinians and their place in the region? What are the dominant tendencies in contemporary Palestinian politics (and resistance)? How do they conceive of Israelis and of Jews?
· Shattered humanity: cruelty and dehumanisation in conflict zones.
The Israeli/Palestinian conflict has been one of the longest ongoing conflicts in the world. How has the nature of this conflict changed over the past few decades? Has it become more brutal over time, and what impact might this have for a political settlement in the region? What lessons can be drawn from similar conflicts in other regions or historical periods? Additionally, what will it take politically to address the legacy of multigenerational trauma on both sides?
· War in Gaza and International Humanitarian law.
What is international (humanitarian) law for? Is international law part of the solution to the conflict in Israel/Palestine or is it an obstacle? Is the Genocide convention the best legal perspective on the war in Gaza? What is the jurisprudence on non-state actors in “international” conflicts? How does international law regulate or how should it regulate asymmetrical conflicts between state and non-state actors
Promotional brochure:
Narrative Conditions Towards Peace in the Middle East
An African Global Dialogue
New South Institute
1. African Global Dialogues
The African Global Dialogues is an initiative of the New South Institute, a South African think tank that focuses on strengthening and building democracy in places struggling with the legacy of colonialism, military dictatorship, and authoritarian rule. NSI works across the African continent, as well as in South America and in Eastern Europe. Our work is focused on the practical tasks of institution-building as a condition of democracy.
2. The War in Gaza
Since the physical assault on Israel on the 7th of October and the subsequent Israeli war with Hamas in Gaza, the public discourse on Israel/Palestine has radicalised in crude and violent ways. The protracted occupation of the West Bank has come to resemble an annexation, calling into question the conditions for a just resolution of the conflict. Right-wing extremism and messianism in Israel, moreover, threatens the fabric of democracy, the rule of law, and puts Israel in existential danger. At the same time, many Israelis, including those who are deeply critical of the current Israeli government, find difficulty being heard in the public domain unless they are willing to reject the right of the Jewish state to exist at all. Palestinian politics, especially since the rise of Hamas, entertains fascist strategies and messianic fantasies. The atrocities committed by Hamas are symptomatic of a profound malaise. What has been lost on all sides is an appreciation of nuance and complexity and, in turn, the search for constructive ways out of the current dead-end.
Informed by the idea that political narratives, especially about history, concepts, friends and enemies, matter, we seek critically to engage current political framings, with a view to opening a discursive space about Israel/Palestine and the region that is conducive to more positive engagement.
As the war continues, with increasingly catastrophic consequences for Palestinian civilians and growing danger for the hostages held by Hamas, so does the polarisation of the public discourse – which only hinders attempts to break out of the zero-sum logic of conflict and destruction, and the increasingly wide gulf between friend and enemy.
Struggles about how to describe and define Israel as a political community, on the one hand, and about the character of Palestinian politics today and the meaning of Hamas, in particular, on the other, have major consequences for how, firstly, we think about the ‘situation’ in the Israel/Palestine – indeed, what is it? (a struggle between two national movements or settler colonialism/ racism?) – and the concrete conditions for what might be called a more “civil” conflict; that is, one without cruelty and dehumanizing violence and one that ultimately opens up the possibility of a meaningful, peaceful settlement. As much as this calls for the right kind of courageous leaders (a Sadat or a Rabin), it also requires humanising political discourses rooted in fact and in empathy. What are the elements of such a narrative?
This is an urgent question, both for mitigating the violence in Gaza and the West Bank, for preventing a regional escalation, and potentially even a wider war, not to mention creating the conditions for a sustainable settlement. It seems to us that current ideological framings cannot do this work.
Posing such questions in and from South Africa is not just topical and likely to generate global attention. It is also an opportunity to host a new, and potentially unprecedented kind of conversation; one hosted in the global South by an organization from the Global South. This event seeks to (re)insert South Africa and the global South more broadly in constructive discussions about the conditions of peace in the Middle East.
3. Logistics
When: 18-20 September 2024
Where: Constitutional Hill, Johannesburg, South Africa
Hosting the event in the space of the constitutional court carries a special resonance in the face of the ICJ case. It invokes a place where different views are sharply yet peacefully argued and resolved. It also serves to remind participants and observers of South Africa’s negotiated, democratic settlement. While parts of the court are public, we will use interior rooms and studios where access will be carefully secured.
Format: This is not a traditional, academic conference where participants deliver papers. Instead, skilled moderators will bring experts into conversation with each other. There will be small, invited audiences for each session, consisting of thought leaders and journalists from South Africa, other parts of Africa and the New South. All sessions broadcast online and publicly, with opportunities for people to phone in and/ to send questions.
