South African Jewish women march against abuse of Gaza hostages

By AFP 8 March 2024, 4:16 pm

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Hostages and Missing families Forum and Bring Them Home Now campaign supporters hold portraits of missing and kidnapped Israeli girls and women during a demonstration outside the South African parliament in Cape Town on March 8, 2024, to mark International Women's day and demanding the release of female hostages taken by Hamas terrorists on the October 7, 2023 attacks. (Photo by AFP)

A group of South African Jewish women held an International Women’s Day march on Friday to denounce their government’s silence regarding abuse by Hamas fighters against Israeli hostages.

Organized by the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD), the women marched in the scorching Johannesburg sun under the banner “Me Too unless you are a Jew”.

“Jewish women are put to an extra burden of proof all over the world,” one of the organizers, Gabriella Farber Cohen, says.

“This one is not like any other women’s day, we are deeply saddened by the horrors and atrocities that were committed by the Hamas terrorists,” she says, accusing President Cyril Ramaphosa of hypocrisy.

A mix of young and old, including high school students, chanted “bring back our girls” as they waved placards with the faces of the females held captive.

“Ramaphosa constantly talks about gender-based violence… the hypocrisy is that he in 154 days has not mentioned one word, not even condemned the sexual violence that these Israeli women had to endure,” Farber Cohen says.

In December, Pretoria made a complaint against Israel in the International Court of Justice ICJ in The Hague, alleging that its assault on Gaza amounts to a breach of the Genocide Convention.