By Hassen Lorgat
Anton Harber’s “The Chief Rabbi who lost his Soul” is a welcome contribution to our political discourse in South Africa, especially when we include its by-line bracketed as (The article that the Jewish Report refused to run).
It is doubly significant as Harber was once a board member of the South African Jewish Report (SAJR) and appeared at times to be a defender of their policies (politics?).
What is clearly undeniable is that the SAJR’s refusal to publish Harber’s damning critique of Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein, is a significant eye-opener for him and many more.
This rejection has shifted Harber onto the side of the illustrious band of dissenters who have been marginalised by the South African Jewish Report over the years.
The SAJR has consistently marginalised and indeed banned dissenting voices in particular those emanating from critical, anti Zionist Jewish intellectuals. Their marginalisation is not always consistent although the vilification in some cases seems to be firmly established across different editorial regimes of the paper.
Others censored or rubbished include the anti Zionist ultra Orthodox Jewish groups Neturei Karta, and the likes of Ronnie Kasrils, Steven Friedman amongst others.
The SAJR – print and online edition, defines itself independent and as “a highly respected newspaper with high quality content covering national and international news of interest to SA Jewry”. Of its print edition it says that its readers include the majority of South African Jewry across the broad political and religious spectrum, as well as people from other faiths and ethnic groups and so on.
Having read it for many years, I can conclude that it has failed to inform and educate its readers and has instead served as an uncritical backer – like the South African Zionist Federation (SAZF) – in support of Israel and Zionism.
The SAJR was formed in 1998 two years after Netanyahu first came to some political prominence and I believe they have chosen to never cross his path and are thus slavishly Zionist in the Netanyahu mould.
On January 25, this year, the SAJR posed a question to Netanyahu, prefacing it with the statement that they were in BDS “ground zero”, where Israel is lambasted all the time by BDS supporters. The paper asked how Israel would help South African Jews in countering this and Netanyahu obliged thus:
“You shouldn’t defend Israel, you should attack and delegitimise the delegitimised,” he said. However, in terms of the South African government’s support of BDS, he said, “We will speak to your government too.
“It might be the last government in Africa that doesn’t recognise that the world has changed. Even the Arab governments are coming to Israel. They no longer view Israel as their enemy”.
There you have it, Netanyahu advising the SAJR but it is mere confirmation that the paper was never pluralist, democratic nor inclusive of all Jewish voices let alone South African voices.
It is a matter of historical record that the SAJR was expelled from the Press Council for failing to apologise for wrongly labelling anti racist human rights activists as anti semitic. They were expelled on 22 May 2022 for what the then Press Council media release noted was a first ever such expulsion for non compliance to the rules of the council. “What our member publications cannot do is simply refuse to publish rulings against them. Compliance by members is essential. To refuse undermines the Press Council and is unfair to the complainants”, Press Council Chair Judge Phillip Levinsohn was quoted as saying.
This expulsion and their denial of space for Anton Harber’s views (this time) is confirmation of the anti democratic nature or the DNA of the SA Jewish Report. Harber may not necessarily agree but let me illustrate this with the supposedly anti semitic cartoon (which the SAJR continues to have on their pages) which was at the heart of our original complaint.
In that matter, Anton Harber and I were on opposite sides of the trenches. I was leading the case for the PSA-BDS and Giwusa whilst he was the erudite professor and former board member arguing in the SAJRs corner.
On the expulsion Harber stood opposed arguing:
“Firstly, the drawing in question clearly draws on a number of ugly antisemitic tropes and it worries me that that wasn’t recognised by the parties involved. It’s also unfortunate that the SAJR is now outside the PCSA’s self-regulatory framework, which all publications should accept if we’re to have a decent and reliable media. Nobody wins in this situation”.
As I and others have argued that the ugly anti semitic tropes are false as the cartoon image was of a man that looked more Trump-like, yellow hair and a small nose, not the desired tropes they argued. They were clearly clutching at straws and Harber was wrong.
Harber has always been an insider – seeking to fight soft and maybe hard battles inside the Jewish Tent. He is not a dissenter like Kasrils and because of that his view has for years been celebrated in the paper. His views were fit to print in the Jewish Report in part because they too, wanted to be associated with Jewish persons who fought against apartheid in the media space.
A quick glance will reveal the SAJR favourably interviewing Harber about his book in 2020 entitled the pitfalls of South African Journalism, which dealt with the collaboration of journalists in state capture. More recently, Harber (and with Manoim) were featured (December 2024 – at the height of the genocide) speaking out against the Netanyahu’s attempts to silence Haaretz. The Netanyahu regime had stopped his government from advertising in Haaretz which the former founding editors of The Weely Mail, correctly labelled censorship. This was a relatively a brave move but criticising the chief rabbi of South Africa was a rubicon SAJR could not cross.
Harber’s criticism of the chief rabbi is late in coming but necessary and most welcomed. He is correct to point out Goldstein’s slavish support for Trump, his mistreatment of women and how he has mocked the weak and disabled as well as his rejection of basic democratic rights and freedoms. Many others have criticised the rabbi’s extreme irritation and anger when Israel was accused of Genocide at the ICJ International Court of Justice but many others in this community continue to remain silent about the genocide.
Before the national elections of May 2024, I wrote about the Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein’s role as the “opstoker” (instigator) in chief for regime change rallying against the ANC and the liberation movements. What must be spoken about more fully elsewhere is the Chief Rabbi’s campaigning against a ceasefire and for support for the genocide against Palestinians.
In one of his notorious broadcasts coinciding with the first anniversary of the 7 October 2004, Goldstein said:
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“What we want is their gratitude to the brave soldiers of the IDF to say thank you for putting your lives on the line for the sake of victory Ad hanitzahon.”
He continued to repeat ad hanitzaron – until final victory 12 times in a 13 minute speech.
Whilst we may all agree that the rabbi is on the bandwagon to make South Africa great again, we must not forget the others that the SAJR has marginalised and vilified over the years. One has to think of comrade Ronnie Kasrils way back in 2006, when he was Minister of Intelligence. The SAJR refused to publish Kasrils’s right of reply to an article that questioned his stance on Israel. It is a matter of public record that the then editor Geoff Sifrin initially approved Kasrils’s request to reply to an article entitled “Some Pertinent Questions to Kasrils” by Anthony Posner who at the end of his piece challenged Ronnie thus:
“So Mr Kasrils now is your chance to engage in ‘civilised discussion’. But perhaps this ‘kitchen’ is too hot for you? … I am sure that the readers of the SAJR will be interested to see whether you have the ability to respond in a rational manner to all the points I have raised in this letter.”
The reneging on this right of reply was predictable and was condemned by all including the Freedom of Expression Institute which slammed Sifrin’s decision. “The newspaper is engaging in contradictory behaviour by publishing an opinion piece posing questions and then denying the person to whom the questions are being put the right to answer them”.
So there you have it. The SAJR, the rabbi and not forgetting the SAZF must cease their uncritical support for the state of Israel and see it for what it is doing. We all have seen it and continue to see it now. These groups must join the the train of truth and call for justice and peace and not speak against ceasefire, and aiding and abetting the genocide.
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