South Africa on Thursday invited Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas to visit, in what would be his first trip outside the Muslim world.
Haniyeh would like to meet with former South African president Nelson Mandela during the trip, according to a Haniyeh aide.
The invitation was issued by visiting Intelligence Minister Ronnie Kasrils, who met Haniyeh.
”We stand by you and support you,” Kasrils said of the new Palestinian unity government, a coalition of Hamas and the Fatah movement of moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
”We in South Africa look forward to you being able to lead a delegation to our country,” Kasrils told Haniyeh at a joint news conference.
Haniyeh accepted the invitation, but no date was set for a trip.
Ahmed Yousef, Haniyeh’s political adviser, said the prime minister would like to meet Mandela.
Another government official from Hamas, Mohammed Madhoun, told a pro-Hamas news website that Haniyeh planned to visit South Africa as a part of a tour to Malaysia, Indonesia and Turkey. Haniyeh may also informally visit Switzerland at the invitation of a civil society group, Madhoun said.
Kasrils demanded that the international community lift its aid embargo on the Palestinian Authority, imposed after the militantly anti-Israel Hamas came to power in elections last year.
”The people of Palestine are facing a collective punishment by those who were not happy with the result of a democratic election,” he said.
The sanctions were designed to pressure Hamas to recognise Israel, renounce violence and accept past agreements signed with the Jewish state. Hamas never met these demands, and the coalition government formed in March has not explicitly done so, either.
But Kasrils said the South African government believes ”the government of Mr Haniyeh and President Abbas have gone a long way to meeting those requirements as we understand them”.
South Africa has been an early supporter of the new Palestinian government.
But the South African official’s comments drew Israeli criticism. Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mark Regev said extending inviting leaders of a movement still pledged to Israel’s destruction would ”entrench extremist positions”.
Regev said the move gave ”legitimacy and recognition to an unreformed extremist Hamas leadership”. — Sapa-AP