Algiers on Sunday condemned the decision of the African Union (AU) to grant Israel observer status to the pan-African organization.
“Taken without the benefit of wide prior consultations with all the Member States, this decision has neither the vocation nor the capacity to legitimize the practices and behaviors of the said new observer which are totally incompatible with the values, principles, and objectives enshrined in the ‘Constitutive Act of the African Union,’ said the Foreign Ministry in a statement, without ever citing the name of Israel.
“The recent decision of the President of the Commission of the African Union (AU) to welcome a new observer who falls under his administrative prerogatives is not likely to alter the constant and active support of the continental organization for the fair Palestinian cause”, underlines the press release relayed by the official APS agency.
“The modes of operation of the African Union do not allow any possibility for the 87 extra-African observer states to influence the positions of the continental organization, whose determination is the exclusive competence of its member states”, insists the Algerian ministry which deplores a “media agitation around what is more of the non-event”.
Diplomatic victory
Israel was granted observer status at the AU on Thursday. which he had been demanding for years, a diplomatic victory for the Hebrew state. Israel, which maintains relations with 46 African countries, had this observer status within the Organization of African Unity (OAU) until its transformation into the African Union in 2002. Palestine already enjoys this status as an African Union. he observer at the AU, where it has significant supporters, in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Since its independence, Algeria has taken up the cause for “the right of peoples to self-determination”, in particular, that of the Palestinians, of which it is one of the historical supporters. It does not maintain diplomatic relations with the “Zionist entity” (Israel). The recent normalization of diplomatic relations between Morocco and Israel, in return for American recognition of Moroccan “sovereignty” over Western Sahara, is criticized by Algeria, which denounced “foreign maneuvers” aimed at destabilizing it.
A new illustration of the sensitivity of the subject in Algeria came from the current Tokyo Olympics, where Algerian judoka Fethi Nourine forfeited to avoid having to face an Israeli opponent, pleading for his support for “the Palestinian cause”. Fethi Nourine was suspended by the International Judo Federation (IJF) and his accreditation was withdrawn. The affair, much commented on social networks, sparked heated debates.
If many Internet users applauded the “courage” of the Algerian judoka, others on the other hand would have preferred that he face the Israeli Tohar Butbul in order to beat him. “The Algerian judoka had the duty to fight the Israeli, to defeat him and thus to defend his national colors and to gain a victory for Algeria and for Palestine. How is his withdrawal beneficial for the Palestinian cause?”, asked the Arabic-language daily El Fadjr.
