Model and actress Shashi Naidoo was slapped with a 10-year ban from Israel after she tried to enter the West Bank to educate herself about Israel’s occupation of Palestine.
MP Mandla Mandela has condemned Israel’s action and called on the South African government to take action, calling for a “total trade, cultural and diplomatic ban on Apartheid Israel”.
GATVOL: Mandla Mandela calls for action. Photo: AYANDA NDAMANE/ INLSA
Naidoo was expected to arrive back in Joburg late Thursday evening and Mandela said: “We will be welcoming Shashi Naidoo back home at 7pm and in the light of the treatment meted out to her, I call on the South African government to send the Israeli Ambassador to South Africa packing.”
After visiting Palestinian refugee camps in Jordan this week, Naidoo was to enter the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) through the Allenby Border Crossing in Jordan.
Speaking from Jordan to journalist, Paula Slier, Naidoo said she had been interrogated at the border, and her passport was stamped - preventing her from returning for a decade.
Israel’s Deputy Ambassador to South Africa, Ayellet Black, claimed Naidoo was denied entry at the Israeli checkpoint because her trip was planned by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement (BDS), and that it would “harm” Israel.
Naidoo, however, is travelling at her own expense, and her trip was planned by the South African Council of Churches and South African Jews for a Free Palestine.
The trip came about after Naidoo copied and pasted a friend’s post on social media to defend Israel’s violent response to peaceful protests in the Gaza Strip that resulted in the death of over 100 Palestinians.
Following a backlash for her pro-Israel posting, with some sponsors dropping her, Naidoo deleted the posts from Instagram and issued several tearful apologies.
She then announced her intention to educate herself about the reality of the Israeli occupation by going to “see for herself”.
Although Naidoo appeared at a press conference hosted by BDS South Africa, she has never advocated or endorsed a boycott of Israel.
Naidoo joins a growing list of Africans who have been denied entry into Palestine and banned by Israel, including MP Blade Nzimande, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu and Justice Richard Goldstone.