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9 Kislev 5761 - December 6, 2000 | Mordecai Plaut, director Published Weekly
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NEWS
Bad Feelings in South Africa
by D. Saks,
Yated South African Correspondent

The mood of shock in the South African Jewish community deepened last week following one of the worst acts of antisemitic vandalism in recent years. The small Jewish cemetery in Lichtenburg, a small, farming town in the north- western part of the country, was found to have been desecrated by one of the last remaining Jewish residents of the town. All but three of the sixty graves were targeted, with all the tombstones pushed over and many of them shattered. It is uncertain at this stage whether there was a link between this cemetery desecration, the third to have taken place over the last 18 months in South Africa, and the current Middle East crisis.

The Jewish community was also affected by the start of a major court case between the South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) and the Islamic Unity Convention over the broadcast of antisemitic material by Radio 786, a Muslim community radio station, in May 1998. The SAJBD lodged a complaint with the Independent Broadcasting Authority following a program on Radio 786 featuring Jewish conspiracy theories, Holocaust denial and various other anti- Jewish canards. The propagation of hate speech against any particular race or ethnic group is expressly prohibited in South Africa.

The Islamic Unity Convention, which runs Radio 786, responded to the SAJBD's complaint by lodging an application in the Johannesburg High Court, claiming that the regulations of the Independent Broadcasting Authority were overly broad and impinged on their freedom of expression. The matter is expected to end up in the Constitutional Court and to be a landmark case with regard to the limits of freedom of expression in South Africa.

 

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