BICOM

Israel has protested a new South African regulation requiring that products made in West Bank settlements be labelled as coming from “occupied Palestinian territory.”

The South African cabinet yesterday voted in favour of allowing the trade minister to require merchants to label products in a way that allows customers to know which goods did not originate in Israel proper but beyond the Green Line, South African government spokesman Jimmy Manyi told a press briefing.

Israel expressed its displeasure at the decision, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor calling the requirement “totally unacceptable” and “blatant discrimination”.

“The measure announced today by the South African cabinet to require special labelling for goods emanating from Israeli settlements is without precedent, as no such measure has ever been adopted in South Africa or in any other country: it constitutes therefore a blatant discrimination based on national and political distinction,” Palmor said.

“Israel and South Africa have political differences, and that is legitimate,” he added. “What is totally unacceptable is the use of tools which, by essence, discriminate and single out, fostering a general boycott. Such exclusion and discrimination bring to mind ideas of racist nature which the government of South Africa, more than any other, should have wholly rejected.”

The South African Jewish Board of Deputies have also criticised the new measures, calling them “discriminatory” and “divisive”.

“They are believed to be motivated not by technical trade concerns but by political bias against the state of Israel,” the group said in a statement.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry have said that South Africa’s ambassador would be summoned to Jerusalem in order to discuss the decision. The Foreign Ministry had already expressed its displeasure over the move in May when the measure was first introduced. The ministry said at the time that the ambassador to South Africa would be reprimanded.