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Jewish bodies say Israel's denial of visa to SA minister 'regrettable' Karl Gernetzky, Business Day, Johannesburg, 28 April 2015 The South African Jewish Board of Deputies and the South African Zionist Federation said on Tuesday the denial of a visa to Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande by the Israeli government was regrettable. The organisations said in a joint statement that any practice of discouraging interaction between South African officials and their Israeli counterparts would be at odds with the manner in which SA traditionally engaged in conflict resolution. Both countries should encourage greater engagement at all levels, the groups said. "It is most unfortunate that, in recent times, South Africa has imposed restrictions on the free movement of officials between this country and Israel, and thereby on opportunities to engage in regular consultation and dialogue in the interests of peace and stability between the Palestinian and Israeli people," the statement read. Mr Nzimande was meant to visit the Palestinian territories on Saturday on a working visit that included discussions with his Palestinian counterpart and the opening of an African Centres Study at a local university. The denial of a visa to Mr Nzimande and other departmental officials has precipitated threats to escalate a campaign that aims to isolate Israel culturally, economically and academically. Groups including the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) have subsequently called for the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador and say they will protest outside the embassy in Pretoria on May 10 should their demands not be met. From: http://www.bdlive.co.za/national/2015/04/28/jewish-bodies-say-israels-denial -of-visa-to-sa-minister-regrettable -- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
