In a scathing analysis, political analyst Nicholas Woode-Smith questions South Africa’s choice of Ebrahim Rasool as ambassador to Washington. Citing Rasool’s anti-Trump rhetoric and alleged connections to Islamist networks, Woode-Smith warns that the appointment risks deepening tensions with the US, threatening vital trade agreements and South Africa’s global standing.
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By Nicholas Woode-Smith*
Ebrahim Rasool will be representing South Africa to the most powerful nation in the world as Ambassador to Washington. This is despite comparing former and incoming President Trump, the President he will be needing to negotiate with and appease for the sake of all South Africans, to Adolf Hitler.
Regardless of his personal views of Trump, Rasool has behaved incredibly unprofessionally. He has used the platform X (formerly Twitter) to repeatedly and vitriolically criticise Trump, even suggesting impeachment. This does not build a positive rapport with the new administration.
Shouldn’t an ambassador with less of a bone to pick with the new and former president be a more prudent pick to represent South Africa? This is especially important as South Africa faces deteriorating relations with the United States. This has threatened our preferential trade relations – raising concerns over AGOA. A trade agreement that has proven incredibly profitable for South Africa, creating over 250,000 estimated jobs and billions in revenue.
In February 2024, the United States sought to investigate South Africa’s “history of siding with malign actors, including Hamas”. South Africa’s vitriolic attacks on Israel and refusal to condemn Russia for its invasion of Ukraine were fundamental reasons that the United States has chosen to become sceptical of future friendly relations with South Africa.
Rasool is not the man to bat for us in Washington. Especially, when one realises that his priorities are likely not in favour of South Africa’s interests, but that of his very overtly Islamist ideology.
Rasool has made little effort to hide his allegiance and association with Islamist interests. Critics assert that Rasool as Premier of the Western Cape prioritised Muslim business networks. Other observers have identified that Rasool is a member of a small circle of radical Islamist officials and figures (including former Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor) that have captured South African foreign policy to serve Islamist interests rather than that of South Africa.
Rasool has spoken of the late Shiekh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi fondly, openly acknowledging a debt to him. Al-Qaradawi helped spearhead the Union of Good, an organisation recognised by the US Department of the Treasury as channelling funds to Hamas, a terrorist organisation. Al-Qaradawi is famous for condoning suicide bombings against Israeli civilians. He was banned from entering the United Kingdom and France as a result.
At a three-day meeting in Doha in 2012, Al-Qaradawi asked Rasool to develop an Islamic jurisprudence for Muslim minorities living in countries that are not Muslim dominated. Rasool’s relationship with Al-Qaradawi and his academic pursuits discussing how Islam can come to have undue influence on non-Islamic countries bely more of his personal ideology.
In 2013, Rasool co-convened a conference about Muslim minorities “Living Where We Don’t Make the Rules”, alongside Ibrahim El-Zayat, a figure linked to Muslim Brotherhood. In 2024, Rasool met with Al-Zayat again, who had since been removed from his posts in Germany due to his association with the terror network Muslim Brotherhood) and helped him meet with business leaders and politicians to ask for funding for the “Palestinian cause”.
In 2019, Rasool spoke at a fundraising dinner which was also attended by senior Hamas official Basem Naim. Rasool tacitly encouraged violence when he encouraged equipping “brothers and sisters for a war that is surely coming.”
After Hamas’ brutal attack on Israel on October 7th 2023, Rasool continued his narrative of falsely accusing Israel of being an apartheid state. A fact proven by the simplest observation of Israel as the most multiracial and multicultural nation in the Middle East, and the only country in the region that consistently protects the rights of all its groups. Rasool refused to condemn or acknowledge Hamas’ brutality, only condemning Israel’s retaliation.
Rasool’s continued support of South Africa’s ludicrous and illogical accusations of genocide against Israel at the International Court of Justice further shows Rasool’s dedication to act against Israel. A policy that the United States will not abide.
In 2004, following the assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, Rasool called the Hamas founder “one of his greatest inspirations” and hoped that Palestinians would “stand up to these enemies and never succumb, that they fight and they fight under a flag of Islam.” He further called for his audience to “face the enemies – they are all over the world”.
Rasool’s motivations are clearly religious and theological. This is further made clear when Rasool’s fellow speakers at a rally in 2004 claimed that “Jews had murdered and killed most of the prophets of God”, another calling Jews “a filthy people”.
Rasool clearly associates with incredibly hateful and violent people, including a cavalcade of Hamas leaders who visit South Africa, including Mohammed Nazzal, a senior member of Hamas who Rasool hosted in 2007 as Western Cape Premier.
In 2015, Rasool was awarded a signed Palestinian scarf by terrorist leader Ismail Haniyeh, for Rasool’s efforts to try unite Hamas and Fatah to improve “coherence of resistance”.
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In 2020, Rasool was listed as a speaker at Al-Quds Day, an event that celebrates Hezbollah.
On top of all of this, Rasool has connections to SAFA, a network of hundreds of non-profits and educational institutions with ties to Al-Qaeda, Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
The list of Rasool prioritising his ties to terror-funding, anti-Israeli activities and global Islamism over his job as a South African official is even longer than this already extensive timeline. It is clear that Rasool uses his positions not to further the prosperity of his home country, but to enhance the influence of an ideology that seeks to ensure the global dominance of Islam, and the destruction of Israel.
The United States will not stand for hosting such a rogue ambassador, with such extensive ties to international terrorism. Not for a second time. We need a dedicated and skilled diplomat in Washington to repair the damage that Pandor and the ANC have caused over the last few years. Not another ideologue who will continue to alienate the world superpower, and further drive South Africa away from profitable trade relations and into the arms of tyrannical rogue states.
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*Nicholas Woode-Smith is an economic historian, political analyst and author.
