By Hassen Lorgat
On 19 March 2024, the reputable fact-checking organization Africa Check published an article by Mary Alexander titled: “Misleading to claim eight South African opposition parties ‘stand with Israel’”. The graphic was reproduced but the authoritative strap runs on the right side of the image reading FALSE.The article’s premise was simple: of the eight parties featured on a viral poster claiming they “stand with Israel,” only two (the ACDP and FF Plus) had explicitly said so.
While presented as a neutral contribution to public discourse ahead of the 2024 elections, this fact-check highlights the philosophical and structural weaknesses of the “fact-checking strategy.” By prioritizing a narrow, literalist test over historical context and political nuance, the “checkers” ended up providing a “free pass” to parties with deep, documented ties to the Israeli state. We are now poised at a similar moment as when this article was first written: President Ramaphosa has designated 4 November 2026 for the Local Government Elections. Already the boot of repression and baby kissing is evident, as townships will once again witness increased anger and violence unleashed on other Africans who have sought to make South Africa their home. Fact checkers must rise above the fumes of propaganda and lies.
The Structural Failures of Modern Fact-Checking
Africa Check asserts: “We follow the same process for every fact-check and let the evidence dictate the conclusions. Africa Check does not advocate or take policy positions.” However, this “non-partisan” stance is itself a problem, especially when addressing responses to a genocidal war.
- The Bias of Selection
Fact-checkers are often accused of bias not in their data, but in their selection. Choosing to fact-check this specific graphic just before an election served to exonerate opposition parties from the political “blame” of supporting Israel during an ongoing genocide.
- The Failure of the “Snapshot”
Fact-checkers often rely on a “snapshot” of a moment—a single tweet or a website mission statement—while ignoring complex, nuanced, or implied falsehoods. By ruling claims as “mostly true” or “half false” without historical context, they fail to educate the public. This narrow methodology leaves the public unconvinced, as it ignores the systems of power behind the statements.
- The Funding Dilemma: A Health Warning
One must delve deeper: Africa Check receives funding from Google and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Bill Gates’ wealth is inextricably linked to Microsoft. Both Google and Microsoft are deeply complicit in what UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese described in her June 2025 report, “From Economy of Occupation to Economy of Genocide,” as providing the core tech infrastructure for the Israeli military.
Albanese argues these corporations have profited from an “economy of genocide,” where technologies are tested in Gaza and marketed as “battle-proven.” Recent investigations by The Guardian and +972 Magazine revealed that Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform was used by the IDF’s elite Unit 8200 to store vast troves of intercepted Palestinian civilian phone calls. Can an organization funded by these tech giants truly be the “neutral” arbiter of facts regarding Israel and Palestine?
- Overreliance and belief in Meta platforms and its standards
In a subsequent article published by the same author under a different headlinehttps://southafrica-info.com/fact-checks/little-evidence-that-eight-major-south-african-opposition-parties-stand-with-israel/ included the sub-heading: It’s an election year in South Africa, and most political parties campaign mainly on local issues. Just two could be said to “stand with Israel”. The verification in this article indicated that it was based on Facebook, X, websites of the parties without a wider scrutiny.
The piece does include a new section on the so-called two-state solution, which I won’t explore in detail here. Suffice it to say, the accompanying graphic now features a moving banner that appears at the bottom thus:
MISSING
CONTEXT”.
This article requires a separate analysis, but for now, it’s worth noting that it does address Meta and Facebook’s standards—relevant to our discussion. The authors write, implying adherence to those standards, that: “Some Facebook and Instagram users may have deleted their posts after Meta’s Third-Party Fact-Checking Program rated their claims as untrue.” This is akin to letting the fox guard the henhouse.
At the same time various reputable bodies which can be found here (Meta’s Censorship of Palestinian Voices) and here and here. The simple point being made here is that Facebook is not an innocent player and has skin in the game to exonerate Israel supporting organisations when it suits them. Human Rights Watch published a report Meta’s Broken Promises:Systemic Censorship of Palestine Content on Instagram and Facebook a few months before this fact checking articles were published arguing:
“The company should improve transparency around requests by governments’ internet referral units, including Israel’s Cyber Unit, to remove content “voluntarily”—that is, without a court or administrative order to do so—and about its use of automation and machine learning algorithms to moderate or translate Palestine-related content. It should carry out due diligence on the human rights impact of temporary changes to its recommendation algorithms that it introduced in response to the hostilities between Israel and Hamas since October 7. Meta should also take urgent steps to work with civil society to set targets for the implementation of its outstanding commitments to address overreach in its content suppression of Palestine-related content.”
Fact or Fiction: Interrogating the “Neutral” Definitions
The Africa Check article defines the region using a sterile, encyclopedic description: “Israel lies between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea… Gaza has been controlled by Hamas since 2007.”
This is wrong and it is a political choice of words that ignores the reality of occupation. Gaza is not a neutral expression but a deeply political conception and a home for many. A December 2024 Amnesty International report, “You Feel Like You Are Subhuman”, defines Israel as an occupying power in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) and Gaza as a site of ethnic cleansing. To understand the “Gaza problem,” one must look at the history of leaders like Levi Eshkol, who in 1967 suggested:
-that Israel needed to “empty” Gaza by first encouraging “voluntary emigration” and later expelling those who would remain by “depriving them of sufficient water so as to leave them with no other choice but to leave as their orchards yellow and wither.”
– that Israeli leaders have adopted “repressive and discriminatory laws, policies and practices… that fail to align with the basic principles of international humanitarian law, make the occupation unlawful, and form part of Israel’s system of apartheid over Palestinians.”
-based on the killing of civilians, destruction, forced displacement, blocked aid, and official statements after October 7, 2023, the report concludes “Israel committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.”
Secondly, the author shows her bias when she Palestinian victims as mere “numbers” while using emotive language like “deadly” for Israeli victims. In addition, fresh evidence was available at the time of publication. In November 2023, the Israeli Foreign Ministry revised the official death toll of the 7 October attacks from approximately 1,400 down to around 1,200. This revision occurred because many badly burned bodies initially identified as Israeli civilians were later determined to belong to Hamas fighters. I will not even go into the Hannibal Directive and the assertions by other writers that Israel was responsible for killings of many of their own parties would not have been exonerated. Many of the leaders of these parties have put themselves out there in the public and this may not be reflected on their websites to show their allegiances to Israel and in many cases the genocide.
Thirdly, we have to go beyond the superficial tests which were employed to exonerate the six parties. The problem is much wider than finding only FF Plus and ACDP guilty of actually expressing support for Israel. If the author cast her net wider, most if not all would be found to be Israel allies and supporter
At least two junkets I know of, targeted political leaders. One in 2015 and one in 2024. They were strategic all expenses paid for trips organised by the Zionist Federations affiliate SAFI.
Casting the Net Wider: The Junkets and Allegiances
The Africa Check article should have dug deeper into historical context and political networking that reveals a far more “cosy” relationship with Israel and by extension a support for their “right to defend itself” with impunity.
Junket 1: The “Fact-Finding” Mission (2015)
In 2015, a high-level delegation organized by the South African Friends of Israel (SAFI) visited Israel.
Photo SAJR. ABOVE are Dr Pieter Mulder, Freedom Front Plus; the Rev Kenneth Meshoe of the ACDP; Dr Mangosuthu Buthelezi of the IFP; Jerusalem Mayor Nir Bar
The SAJR led with the headline: Holomisa, Lekota: Israel NOT an apartheid state. In 2015, Bantu Holomisa and Mosiuoa Lekota—a former defence minister and anti-apartheid activist—visited Israel with a South African opposition delegation. Afterwards, they rejected claims that Israel is an apartheid state, noting that unlike apartheid South Africa, Israel does not have segregated public services. The Jewish Report and Radio Islam’s podcast, reproduced by SAJR, also explain their collaboration with Israel.
This shows that “facts” are highly contested and not determined by a simple test. In such junkets, Friends of Israel helped engineer what were called “facts” on fact-finding missions. The writer, Mary Alexander, seemingly ignored available context and the groups’ cosy relationship with Israel, offering flimsy exoneration. I will now turn to Junket number 2.
Junket 2: The “Secret” 2024 Trip
This junket was also organised by SAFI and it is thanks to the Good Party that this matter came to public attention.
The IOL, and others reported on this trip which many of the participants referred to as a “fact-finding mission” organized by the South African Friends of Israel. This was contested by many, who believe that if the full facts were put under scrutiny it would reveal a deep Zionist support amongst them for Israel and its policies. This trip was “secret” and included participants from the DA, PA and the African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP). All the delegates were Members of Parliament and confirmed that there was no evidence of apartheid and, to the contrary, Israel is a vibrant progressive multi-racial society. This they said amidst an ongoing genocide. In their statement SAFI referred to West Bank and Gaza by their Zionist names suggesting that the facts were in contradiction with international law thus: “the delegates visited the devastated sites of Kibbutz Aza and the Nova Music Festival, where they heard harrowing testimonies from survivors of the October 7th massacre. They also engaged in high-level meetings with Israeli President Isaac Herzog, senior Foreign Ministry officials, and visited communities in Bethlehem, Judea, and Samaria.” Those who found no apartheid included the Democratic Alliance (DA) spokespersons on Justice and on International Relations, Glynnnis Breytenbach and Emma Louise Powell, respectively; DA members of Parliament, Katherine Christie, Bridget Masango, Nicholas Myburgh, Liam Jacobs and Bonginkosi Madikizela. From the Patriotic Alliance (PA) came MPs Ashley Sauls and Millicent Mathopa; and MP Steve Swart represented the African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP).
Such a high profile visit with photos was out there for all to see confirming prior affiliations and loyalties.
I will now briefly look at all these parties exonerated.
I will now briefly look at all these parties exonerated.
The Parties: A Record of Support
The ACDP
They have been found guilty but on not too strong grounds and I will not delve into them. There are Christian Zionist sentiments as well as the fact that the leader Kenneth Meshoe’s late, elder daughter Olga Meshoe Washington was deeply involved in Israel advocacy work. She founded and directed DEISI (Defend, Embrace, Invest, Support Israel), served on the board of the Institute for Black Solidarity with Israel, and reportedly worked as Chief Operating Officer of Club Z, a US-based Zionist youth movement .
Congress of the People, COPE
On 6 September 2023, in a SAFI-hosted YouTube interview SAFI spokesperson Bafana Modise spoke to Mosiuoa Lekota, on all things Israel and South Africa. Modise said Jewish people were indigenous, and denied that Israel was an apartheid state. He added that Jews in Palestine are not and were not colonisers and so on.
In other reports, such as the SAJR no apartheid in Israel article and rebroadcast radio Islam podcast quoted above, the Jerusalem Post in September already ran an article that defended, therefore stood by Israel and for Israel. It was entitled: Israel is not an apartheid state, former South African defense minister says
Mosiuoa Lekota: “In Israel, you won’t find the same divisions between Jews and non-Jews that we used to witness during apartheid.”
If I could find these so easily, I do not understand why they could simply quote that Cope’s leader, Mosiuoa Lekota, has vaguely supported South Africa’s genocide case against Israel on X (formerly Twitter) three times. He also welcomed a court ruling that said Israel must prevent genocide in Gaza. In November, the party rejected one of its own officials who said Cope would stand with Israel. Looking at x and facebook will not tell you that Willie Madisha the then Vice-President of COPE, was a avid supporter of Palestine since he was COSATU president a while back, condemning Israel for being worse than apartheid. Later these conflicts were reported by media agencies like the Media Review Network.
This is not to suggest that things were easy or that he had indeed changed or that there were nuances; but the overwhelming posturing and courting by SAFI and others in 2023 shows that they were firmly in Israel’s camp. The media splashes happened after Oct 7 and were used as a show of support for Israel.
The Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP)
Proudly Israel. The late founder and former IFP president, Prince Buthelezi, who died on 9 September 2023, supported Israel when it was unpopular and advocated for closer ties between Israel and South Africa. He rejected the definition of Israel as an “apartheid state,” calling it a “unique case of democracy.” The Israeli government helped KwaZulu under apartheid in areas such as agriculture, leadership training, and women’s co-ops.
He related to Israel as “brothers in suffering,” sharing a sense of mutual struggle and preferred that South Africa play a mediating role rather than isolating Israel.
As Chief Minister of the erstwhile apartheid ruled KwaZulu Government, Buthelezi was invited to visit Israel at the invitation of then Prime Minister Shimon Peres in August 1985. There he met with Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir and former Foreign Minister Abba Eban, whose birthplace was Cape Town.
There is much to say about the relationship between Israel and its South African bantustan connections and the contradictions but this must be done elsewhere. Suffice to say that the Journal of Palestine Studies, Spring 1986, examines Israel’s contradictory stance on South Africa’s bantustans and touches on various points, including the Begin government selling planes to Ciskei, and Israeli agricultural projects operating there, and so on. It involved more than KwaZulu, including others as well.
https://sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/archive-files/CCV485.1021.5123.004.000.1985.11.pdf
The Patriotic Alliance (PA)
Patriotic Alliance (PA) leader Gayton McKenzie calls himself “the biggest friend of Israel in modern politics.” In a South African Jewish Report (May 9, 2024), he contrasted his consistent support with the Democratic Alliance’s “cowardice” for hedging its position on the Israel-Hamas conflict.
SAJR (photo)
McKenzie backs Israel he explains on religious grounds: “The religion I follow commands me to bless and pray for Israel. I am a Christian and I will listen to the Bible.” He has visited Israel multiple times before and after October 7, and the PA previously argued that “Israel has answers for SA” (South African Jewish Report).
He claims self-sufficiency and independence from friends like Hersov, a neoliberal ideologue and a devout friend of Israel (“I have my own money” – TimesLIVE, April 2023). This has not stopped Hersov on 17 March 2024 from writing an ode of loyalty to Gayton Kingmaker Gayton accompanied with a graphic probably with their approval. (Note the article was published 2 days before the Fact Check piece, yet Gayton gets a free pass). Extract and graphic from Biznews
“
“To you his last penny, he’d give,
And he’d ask for none back, cause his visions on track,
G just wants you to be safe where you live.
He stands up for Israel, he wants rule of law,
No Commies or socialists too, “
In November 2023, the ANC supposedly gave the PA an ultimatum to drop its pro-Israel stance or leave coalition arrangements, according to reports. McKenzie publicly refused, stating their agreement with the ANC “would be coming to an end” and that the PA “will not change its stance on Israel’s war on Gaza simply to maintain its coalition with the ANC.” (Daily Maverick).
In a subsequent video interview (April 2024), he called Hamas a terrorist organisation, voiced full support for Israel, and said he would stop the ICJ case.
After the second SAFI junket was exposed, the PA replied: “The Patriotic Alliance’s leadership has therefore never made a secret of their support for Israel, as well as our support for peace between Israel and Palestine. Anyone who may have missed this fact is either living under an extremely large rock or has an extremely small brain. We continue to call for the release of the hostages that the Hamas terror group took from Israel, and for the end to the war.”
In June 2025, the PA joined another junket to Israel. According to the hosts, SAFI,“a SAFI hosted best-practice visit to Israel for 22 members of the Patriotic Alliance (PA) late last month, the PA has undertaken to leverage their position within the Government of National Unity to increase South Africa’s trade and economic relationship with Israel.” (SAFI statement).
There is ample evidence of where the PA stood before the article and afterwards but this was seemingly missed by the fact-checker.
The Democratic Alliance (DA)
On Palestine
The DA is a deeply troubled party, and its position on Israel–Palestine lies at the very heart of the problem. It has long made life difficult for internal dissenters, particularly those who call out the DA’s silence during successive wars on Gaza.
Photo Credit: Ambassador A Lenk, on X
The fact checkers did not see the recently resurfaced photo of the then DA leader Mmusi Maimane meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu in 2017—currently facing a warrant of arrest for
charges of crimes against humanity and war crimes, committed in the Gaza Strip from at least October 8, 2023, until at least May 20, 2024. He is accused with his then minister of defence Yoav Gallant.
The DA defended the 2017 visit, claiming Maimane sought peace by meeting both sides but at the end of the day only met Netanyahu. Yet the Palestinian embassy in South Africa said it was never notified, questioning the DA’s true commitment to Palestinian rights peace in the region.
In another odd twist, rooted more in Johannesburg local politics than principle, DA mayor Mashaba suspended health MMC Dr. Mpho Phalatse for calling herself and the city “friends of Israel.” Mary Alexander used this case to give the DA a pass on pro-Israel sympathies. That easy exoneration fools no one; many remember the DA’s long record of silence and complicity.
But it was the Cachalia affair that truly exposed the party.
In November 2023, DA leader John Steenhuisen removed Ghaleb Cachalia from the shadow cabinet for defying a caucus gag on speaking about Gaza. Cachalia tweeted: “I will not be silenced. Israel is committing genocide. Full bloody stop.” The DA called his conduct selfish and undisciplined. Cachalia and his supporters called it selective censorship, noting that Helen Zille was free to defend her colonial views. Ultimately, the DA’s effective siding with genocide drove Cachalia to resign in January 2024.
On Ukraine
In contrast to its silence on Palestine, the DA’s support for Ukraine is loud and clear, with John Steenhuisen asserting that “there can be no neutrals” in that conflict. The interview took place on 10 May 2022 months before the October 2023 Hamas attacks were brought up to show the DA’s duplicity when it came to Palestine. To ignore this nuance, the fact checkers made their misleading call as these facts did not suit their approach.
Conclusion: Facts Without Context are Hollow
This piece is about the importance and the correct place of facts. In Charles Dickens’ Hard Times, Thomas Gradgrind demands: “Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life.”
In our hard times, we demand more but it seems that Africa Check’s Mary Alexander followed this Gradgrind philosophy, providing a literalist check that failed to dig deeper into the “cosy” relationships, junkets, and ideological allegiances of these parties.Facts, we all know, are important, and for journalists and media workers, they are integral to laying the foundation for accuracy in reporting.
The Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics recommends that: responsibility, verification, original sources, context, accountability, and giving voice to the voiceless be upfront and centre. Importantly, the SPJ Code warns, among other things, that “neither speed nor format excuses inaccuracy.”
In the above, we have witnessed a rushed job to coincide with the elections that resulted in the exonerating of parties allied to Israel. The article ignored the evidence—historical and contemporary—of these parties’ close ties to Israel, including denial of apartheid and genocide, and support for the Gaza war. Fact-checking and context are essential to creating a basis for open and robust discussions. By rushing a fact-check to coincide with an election, and by ignoring the historical evidence of “fact-finding” missions, organised by Israeli lobby groups, the checkers effectively became part of the – disinformation, misinformation and false reporting cycle — themselves. This must not be allowed to happen again, especially since election season is upon us again in South Africa.
The task of a writer is not to give ANY of the powerful political actors a “free pass.” The platform owners, the donors all are part of the story as is the methodology and ethics of the researchers and journalists.The evidence—historical, contemporary, and visual as well as non-recorded interviews —shows that the parties in question have or had serious and some continue to have active relations with the state of Israel. To claim otherwise is not a “fact-check”; but the impoverishment of our discourse.
ENDS
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