Ramallah – Together – At the invitation of the South African Council of Churches; A delegation from Kairos Palestine participated in a visit to South Africa, which included a number of cathedrals, churches, universities, and active community and cultural institutions in Cape Town, Johannesburg, and Pretoria, where the Kairos delegation met with political, community, and religious leaders, and emphasized, strengthening the bonds of solidarity and common interdependence with the people of the South. An African who had been suffering for many years under the clutches of the apartheid regime, inspired by his struggle for liberation and against apartheid. The Kairos delegation also praised the moral commitment of the State of South Africa in its full and unconditional support for the Palestinian cause, and its going to the International Court of Justice to sue Israel after it committed the crime of genocide. In the Gaza Strip.
The visit included multiple meetings, which began with a meeting with the Archbishop of
Cape Town, Bishop Thabo Makgoba, followed by fruitful meetings with both Islamic and Jewish groups, which in turn encouraged interfaith dialogue, in addition to a unique visit to the Gottsville Mosque, which was draped in Palestinian flags welcoming the hosting of Rev. Dr. Munther Ishaq and the accompanying Kairos delegation. The meetings as a whole expressed the need to redouble efforts to combat hate speech, violence, Islamophobia, and anti-Semitism, warning of the importance of confronting Christian Zionism, which uses the texts of the Bible with a colonial flavor in the service of the Zionist project. The visit also included holding seminars at the Desmond Tutu Center and the Nelson Mandela Foundation, as well as holding lectures at the universities of Stellen Bush, Nelson Mandela, Pretoria, and South Africa, and the attendees shared the testimonies of the Kairos delegation about the injustice of Palestine, and how daily life is under the occupation and the apartheid regime that Israel is pursuing it agai
nst the Palestinians.
On the sidelines of his visit, the Kairos Palestine delegation participated in the first international conference against apartheid, which was held in the city of Johannesburg, which aimed to strengthen the global solidarity movement for Palestine and intensify work to dismantle the policies of apartheid, settler colonialism, and genocide practiced by Israel against the Palestinian people, as he stressed. The conference stressed international support for the Palestinian struggle for self-determination, as well as the right of return for Palestinian refugees.
The Kairos Palestine delegation also expressed its gratitude and appreciation to the South African people for their commitment to fighting the injustice and oppression experienced by the Palestinian people, stressing the continuation of its work for a just peace based on inalienable rights, calling on other civil society organizations that attended and people of good conscience to put pressure on your governments from In order to i
mpose a boycott and sanctions on Israel, and the necessity of continuing peaceful punitive measures until the latter fulfills its obligations to recognize the right of the Palestinian people, end the occupation and the apartheid regime on the occupied land of Palestine, recognize the basic right and full equality of its Palestinian Arab citizens, and respect, protect and support the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes. And restore their property, as stipulated by international law.
The Palestinian Christian Initiative/Kairos Palestine is considered a Palestinian Christian movement based on the (Pause for Right) document that was launched in 2009, which is the word of Palestinian Christians to the world about what is happening in Palestine, which confirms that Palestinian Christians are an integral part of the Palestinian people, as many signed it. Important and historically recognized Palestinian Christian organizations, endorsed by the heads of churches in Jerusalem.
The document repres
ents a theological, political, religious and national position on Palestine and the arbitrary practices of the occupation on its land, directing it to the international community and demanding that they take a rightful stand towards the injustice, displacement, suffering and clear racial discrimination that the Palestinian people have been facing for more than seven decades, under the nose and nose of the international community, which is silent and timid in its criticism of the state. Occupation. The document aims to mobilize Christians around the world and the international community to support the Palestinian cause and adhere to all the provisions proposed by the document to pressure governments towards ending the occupation and the apartheid regime on the land of Palestine, calling for just peace and an end to the suffering of the Palestinian people and their right to self-determination, based on the values ??of faith, hope and love.
Source: Maan News Agency