The family of Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s revered anti-apartheid leader, has urged the South African Olympic Committee to continue to call for Israel’s exclusion from the Olympic Games.
The renewed calls came after Israeli authorities detained the head of the Palestine Olympic Committee. On Tuesday, Jibril Rajoub was detained by Israeli authorities as he returned from the Paris Olympic Games in France.
“We condemn the participation of Apartheid Israel at the Paris Olympics and the detaining of the head of the Palestine Olympic Committee,” read the statement from Mandela’s grandson Nkosi Zwelivelile from the Royal House of Mandela.
“We will continue to lobby South African athletes and the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC), to object to their participation in the 2028 Olympics.”
The Royal House expressed disappointment that SASCOC failed to withdraw the South African team from the Paris closing ceremony “in protest against the presence of the genocide Zionist state of Apartheid Israel.”
The statement pointed out that South Africa was expelled from the Olympics in 1964 for its apartheid policies, drawing a comparison to the current situation.
“Yet we marched with the Apartheid Israel Olympic team that has nothing less than 30 athletes who participated directly in the genocide and who took a break from active duty of killing over 40 000 Palestinians in Gaza to participate in the Paris Olympic Games,” it added.
Mandela, ardent supporter of Palestine
Nelson Mandela, the iconic South African anti-apartheid revolutionary and former president, was a vocal supporter of the Palestinian cause. He famously said: “We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.”
During the Paris Olympics, Gaza continued to see death and destruction, including the bombings that claimed over 100 civilians, including women and children.
“Notwithstanding the genocide that they are committing now, nor the war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity that they have committed over the past 76 years, the leadership of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) permitted Apartheid Israel’s participation in the Olympic Games despite massive public protest in Lausanne, Paris and Geneva,” noted the statement from the Royal House of Mandela.
“This Olympics will go down in history as the Olympics that normalized genocide, as the Olympics that allowed the participation of murderers of babies, children, women, and innocent Palestinian civilians seeking shelter,’ it added.
The Mandela family argued that supporting Israel’s involvement in international events like the Olympics, as well as other cultural and diplomatic engagements, implies acceptance of current policies and shows insufficient regard for Palestinian lives.
The statement recalled that it took eight years of sustained activism before South Africa was banned from the Olympics due to its apartheid policies.
“We therefore call upon all sports federations and sport codes not to give up the fight. The struggle continues. We believe in the just nature of the Palestinian struggle and we will continue to support their just cause,” it said.
