Africa must not abandon Palestine

Dr Ramzy Baroud is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Islam and Global Affairs based at the Istanbul University in Turkey. In his article, Baroud was reminding African nations and their citizens not to abandon the Palestinian struggles as they are synonymous with the struggles that Africa went through in their quest for decolonisation.

Currently there are some serious divisions in the African Union over Israel’s Observer membership status and this is emblematic of a larger conflict that could potentially split the African continent’s largest political institutions. Baroud decries the fact Africa is currently facing one of its most crucial decisions regarding Palestine and Israel. He states that the repercussions of this decision could be as significant as the 1975 Resolution 77 (XII) by the Organisation of African Unity, the precursor to the African Union, which recognised Zionism, Israel’s founding ideology, as a form of racism. This time around, however, it is Palestine, not Israel, that stands to lose.