{"id":4390,"date":"2025-07-28T12:10:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T12:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/ramaphosa-lobbies-the-world-to-impose-sanctions-on-israel-and-prosecute-israels-leaders-but-ordinary-south-africans-will-be-left-to-pay-a-heavy-price\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T05:19:26","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T05:19:26","slug":"ramaphosa-lobbies-the-world-to-impose-sanctions-on-israel-and-prosecute-israels-leaders-but-ordinary-south-africans-will-be-left-to-pay-a-heavy-price","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/ramaphosa-lobbies-the-world-to-impose-sanctions-on-israel-and-prosecute-israels-leaders-but-ordinary-south-africans-will-be-left-to-pay-a-heavy-price\/","title":{"rendered":"Ramaphosa lobbies the world to impose sanctions on Israel and prosecute Israel\u2019s leaders \u2014 but ordinary South Africans will be left to pay a heavy price"},"content":{"rendered":"
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<\/figure>\n

By Staff Writer<\/em><\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has strongly condemned the recent summit of \u201cThe Hague Group\u201d convened in Bogot\u00e1, Colombia, as a politically motivated assembly orchestrated to advance an international campaign of delegitimisation against the Jewish state through lawfare and sanctions. At the centre of the controversy is South Africa\u2019s President Ramaphosa, who played a leading role in convening and shaping the summit\u2019s anti-Israel agenda.<\/p>\n

Described by the organisers as an \u201cemergency conference,\u201d the two-day meeting (15\u201316 July) brought together delegations from 32 countries, under the banner of opposing what the summit called Israel\u2019s \u201cimpunity\u201d in Gaza. The summit culminated in the adoption of six punitive measures aimed directly at Israel, including an arms embargo, restrictions on port access, and the invocation of universal jurisdiction to pursue legal actions against Israeli leaders.<\/p>\n

An architect of hostility<\/strong><\/p>\n

President Cyril Ramaphosa was represented at the summit by a senior delegation consisting of Zane Dangor, South Africa\u2019s Director-General of the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), and Ronald Lamola, the Minister for DIRCO.<\/p>\n

Dangor co-chaired the proceedings alongside Colombia\u2019s acting Foreign Minister, Rosa Yolanda Villavicencio. Dangor used the platform to advance a narrative that echoed calls by extremist actors seeking to isolate Israel diplomatically, economically, and militarily.<\/p>\n

In his opening remarks, Dangor claimed the summit marked \u201ca new phase in the struggle against apartheid and colonialism in the 21st century,\u201d drawing a controversial and legally unsubstantiated parallel between Israel and the apartheid regime once present in South Africa. His language, deeply inflammatory in tone, underscored the direction of the summit: away from dialogue and towards punitive collective action against Israel.<\/p>\n

Diplomatic sources in Washington DC and Jerusalem have expressed concern that Dangor\u2019s high-profile role in the summit reflects an escalation in South Africa\u2019s foreign policy posture towards Israel, transitioning from rhetorical condemnation to the active mobilisation to build a global coalition to impose a wide array of punitive sanctions on Israel.<\/p>\n

Coordinated legal warfare<\/strong><\/p>\n

The summit\u2019s final communiqu\u00e9, drafted under the oversight of Dangor and Lamola, calls for:<\/p>\n

\u2022 An international arms embargo on Israel
\u2022 Legal reviews of all state contracts and investments to sever ties with Israeli companies or institutions, or companies affiliated with Israel
\u2022 Blocking access to ports and airspace for any vessel or aircraft suspected of supplying Israel with military equipment
\u2022 Support for universal jurisdiction laws to facilitate prosecutions of Israeli officials<\/p>\n

In the event, only 12 out of the 32 countries in attendance signed the communiqu\u00e9: South Africa, Colombia, Bolivia, Cuba, Indonesia, Iraq, Libya, Malaysia, Namibia, Nicaragua, Oman, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s legal experts see this as part of a broader campaign of lawfare \u2014 the use of international legal mechanisms to harass and delegitimise Israel under the guise of justice.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was not a neutral forum on human rights,\u201d one senior Israeli diplomat told\u00a0Haaretz<\/em>. \u201cIt was a political tribunal, orchestrated by Zane Dangor, who has made no secret of his hostility towards Israel. His role in drafting measures that mimic the BDS playbook on a state level is dangerous and corrosive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jerusalem\u2019s diplomatic response<\/strong><\/p>\n

Israel has lodged formal protests with the governments of Colombia and South Africa and is calling on allied states to publicly reject the summit\u2019s conclusions. Israel\u2019s Foreign Minister, Israel Katz, described the summit as \u201ca grotesque inversion of justice.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cInstead of condemning the genocidal terrorism of Hamas, these nations chose to scapegoat Israel for defending its people,\u201d Katz stated. \u201cZane Dangor and his allies have weaponised international law to serve an ideological agenda that erases context, erodes credibility, and emboldens terrorist actors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Israeli officials also noted with concern that the summit featured speeches from known prejudiced critics of Israel, including UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese and Palestinian UN envoy Riyad Mansour \u2014 both of whom have been accused of employing anti-Israel rhetoric and one-sided reporting.<\/p>\n

A line crossed<\/strong><\/p>\n

By leading the charge to create and coordinate an international sanctions movement against Israel, Zane Dangor has emerged as a chief architect of a new phase of institutionalised anti-Israel hostility \u2014 one that threatens not only Israel\u2019s diplomatic standing but the integrity of international law itself.<\/p>\n

As one Israeli observer noted: \u201cThe summit didn\u2019t seek peace, dialogue, or mutual recognition. It sought to criminalise Israel\u2019s existence. That\u2019s not diplomacy \u2014 it\u2019s incitement dressed in legal robes.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Staff Writer Israel\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has strongly condemned the recent summit of \u201cThe Hague Group\u201d convened in Bogot\u00e1, Colombia, as a politically motivated assembly orchestrated to advance an international campaign of delegitimisation against the Jewish state through lawfare and sanctions. At the centre of the controversy is South Africa\u2019s President Ramaphosa, who<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4391,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4390"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4392,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4390\/revisions\/4392"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/national\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}