RW Johnson: Ebrahim Rasool, the man from a moral superpower

Key topics:.South Africa's U.S. ambassador, Ebrahim Rasool, expelled for controversial remarks.Rasool's lack of qualifications and ties to Hamas, Hezbollah raised concerns.Diplomatic response to U.S. aid cuts criticized for disregarding American generosity..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here..Support South Africa's bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here..If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..By RW Johnson ___STEADY_PAYWALL___.America's expulsion of the South African ambassador, Ebrahim Rasool, is a rare diplomatic disgrace – the only other diplomats expelled from America in peacetime were Soviet officials accused of spying. This after Rasool had most unwisely decided to lecture the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection on his analysis of MAGA as a white supremacist movement – something any sensible diplomat would have avoided. .However, that hardly matters. For some time Ramaphosa has been warned by many commentators (myself included) that Rasool was a most unfortunate choice of ambassador. The notion that a second rank ANC politician would make a good choice for South Africa's most important diplomatic job was always pretty peculiar. Qualifications for the job include a good knowledge of America, a thorough knowledge of American history and politics, an equally thorough grounding in the history and practice of international relations and a knowledge of international trade practices. Rasool had none of that and he had a history of links with Hamas and Hezbollah which could have had him thrown out of the US at any moment. As Senator Jim Risch, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, observed of Rasool, "Suffice it to say he is not cut out for diplomacy.".It is worth pointing out that an organisation called Middle East Forum – Islamist Watch claims credit for Rasool's expulsion. The MEF director, Sam Westrop, wrote an extensive analysis of Rasool's contacts with Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah, as also his support for the Iranian regime in a December 2024 article for Focus on Western Islamism, as also his membership of the SAAR network in America, which has been investigated by the FBI for its links with international terrorism. This document was widely shared on Capitol Hill and was chiefly responsible for Rasool's blacklisting by Republican staffers. .It goes without saying that all of Rasool's Islamist contacts are wildly anti-semitic and Rasool himself is a regular contributor to the (South African) anti-semitic Muslim newspaper, Al-Qalam, which runs editorials accusing Jews of creating a "DA Zionist coalition" which is developing a "little Israel" in Cape Town to pave the way for the Israeli colonization of the Western Cape. It is quite normal to find articles in Al-Qalam referring to "the filthy Jews" and asserting that the Jews are "a filthy nation"..The Presidency in Pretoria has merely called Rasool's eviction "regrettable", but the fact is that the government is to blame. They were extensively warned that Rasool was not someone that the US administration would find it acceptable to deal with but this they simply ignored. In fact, as the news website Semafor reported, Rasool has found it all but impossible to do his job since all his attempts to meet with State Department officials and key Republican figures have failed. Word had clearly gone out in such circles that Rasool was an undesirable. In that sense Marco Rubio's decision to declare Rasool Persona Non Grata was merely making public what was already a de facto situation..No doubt Rasool's fate will provoke the usual round of South African indignation together with media articles insisting that we must stick to our principles in the face of Trump's bullying etc. This is wrong-headed in several different ways. Trump may be odious but he and his party will rule America for the foreseeable future and every smaller country will have to find a way of living with that. Sending ambassadors to the US who are pro-Hamas or who behave undiplomatically is not a way to do that. .When USAID money was cut off with the consequent damage to the Pepfar (anti-Aids) programme and the large consequential damage to the UCT and Wits medical schools, there was a great deal of outrage and there were suggestions from some – notably from Gwede Mantashe – as to how we should hit back against America. This was ridiculous. The Pepfar programme was set by by George W. Bush for five years. It was remarkably generous, pouring more than $400 million a year into South African health facilities, and the programme has run for eighteen years, far longer than was promised..Similarly, the money from the US National Institutes of Health was a generous free gift from the US to South Africa. Or again, AGOA is not a trade treaty, it is a unilateral piece of American generosity, offering Africans privileged access to the US market while asking for no trade concessions in return. No other country has made such generous gifts to South Africa. .So, when the US decides – for whatever reason – to cease these programmes, the correct response is surely to say, well, thank you very much for your unexampled generosity which has given us a wonderful helping hand over many years. It is ridiculous – indeed, the reaction of a spoilt child – to suggest that we should take revenge because this flow of unilateral gifts is stopping. .Similarly, media articles suggesting that the US now has "blood on its hands" because it is not continuing to give away hundreds of millions of dollars a year for South African Aids victims are absurd. The truth is, of course, that South Africans, including the government, have simply taken this American generosity for granted (to the extent that most could never have told you that it existed). At the very least the US might have expected South Africa to show its gratitude by not adopting a provocatively anti-American foreign policy. That would merely have been good manners and simple prudence..When Rasool was leaving Cape Town for Washington he told his local mosque that "I believe that I go (to Washington) as a representative of a moral superpower in a world that has lost its moral anchors." This amazing self-righteousness in a country wracked by corruption and one of the world's highest murder rates is a good example of South African parochialism. What is lacking is a realisation that in the rest of the world such claims are simply laughable..Similarly, there is indignation in South Africa that the US has described Rasool as "a race-baiting politician". But the fact is that race-baiting politicians are absolutely the norm here, so much so that they often fail to excite comment. Look at ANC MPs describing DA resistance to tax increases as an attempt to defend white privilege, let alone what the EFF and MKP say. Kill the Boer, kill the farmer? Cut the throat of whiteness? It is the small change of South African politics..In the same way, there is strong government and media condemnation of Elon Musk for saying that South Africa has "racist ownership laws". But of course it does. No less than 142 laws on the statute book make use of racial definitions. It is a simple replay of the apartheid period, with a different team providing the referee and the goal keeper. Musk may have all sorts of crazy political notions but is he really wrong to say that he isn't allowed to bring Starlink to South Africa because he's not black? .The law says that any new investor here must have at least 30% BEE ownership. Starlink is one of the divisions of SpaceX, the $350 billion company that Musk has built from scratch. Musk owns 42% of SpaceX. If he has kept his South African passport and if indeed he was black then surely he is right? If a South African black entrepreneur had achieved what Musk has and presented himself back here, offering Starlink, surely he would be welcomed with open arms?.What is missing here is the same as under apartheid, a sense of what is normal in a civilised democratic society. No other country in that world would even attempt to defend laws where race is the criterion. I well remember when Denis Worrall was South African ambassador to Britain. During the1980s he was asked on TV how he could possibly justify the Immorality Act: surely anyone should be free to marry whomsoever he/she chose?.Worrall replied, "Of course I can't justify that. It's an abomination. South Africa is emerging from a long and difficult history and as a result we still have mad laws like that on our statute book. But they will go, I promise you that. My country is changing quite fast and laws like that will soon be tossed into the dustbin." This was an intelligent answer which won him great respect in Britain. What we need now is ambassadors who give similar replies when asked about BEE, people who do not absurdly believe that we are a moral superpower, people who do not tolerate antisemitism or any other form of racism, and people who do not support terrorist movements anywhere..Read also:.🔒 US threatens to shut Johannesburg consulate over Leila Khaled Street name rowBN Briefing – Pollak: Rasool's expulsion a warning to SA govt; Heystek: Protect yourself from ANC dysfunctionThe illicit cigarette barons' annual R29-billion tax robbery…

RW Johnson: Ebrahim Rasool, the man from a moral superpower

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