Antisettler resistance and transnational solidarity: Francesco Pontarelli, ‘Rooted in Resistance: Historical Perspectives on South Africa–Palestine Solidarity – a Conversation with Professor Salim Vally’, Notebooks: The Journal for Studies on Power, 2024 | settler colonial studies blog

Antisettler resistance and transnational solidarity: Francesco Pontarelli, ‘Rooted in Resistance: Historical Perspectives on South Africa–Palestine Solidarity – a Conversation with Professor Salim Vally’, Notebooks: The Journal for Studies on Power, 2024

20Jun24

Excerpt: FP: Would you also say that the solidarity between Palestinians and South Africans originates from a recognition of similar experiences of oppression, rooted in racist systems of settler colonialism? SV: I think these similarities are very stark because we can talk not only at the level of economic relationships, but also at the level of socio-psychological relationships. The Afrikaners saw themselves as beleaguered, as a chosen people and, based on their interpretation of the Bible, they considered that they were given this land by God. There were strong similarities between the Afrikaners’ Calvinistic religious fundamentalism and political Zionism, and these were both overlayed by deep racism. Both peoples were imbued with a sense of superiority and a civilising mission against the native people. They share the kind of psyche of settler colonialism and racial capitalism where the indigenous people are seen as savages and uncivilised. The difference is that Israel has managed to spin it in such a way that they had been there for centuries, which is actually not true. It’s a myth. The Zionists, many of whom were atheists, opportunistically used the Old Testament, and – like the Afrikaners – their claim to the land was based on the view that it was ‘a land without a people for a people without a land’.

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