South
African lawmaker Mandla Mandela, grandson of Nelson Mandela, is joining other activists on the Global Sumud Flotilla to Gaza, which aims to break the Israeli blockade on the war-ravaged Gaza Strip.
Mandela is joining a group of 10
South
African activists in the Global Sumud Flotilla, which includes dozens of boats and hundreds of people from 44 countries, including Swedish activist Greta Thunberg.
Mandla Mandela, 51, spoke to Reuters on Wednesday evening at Johannesburg Airport, where he was boarding a flight to Tunisia to join a flotilla aiming to deliver food and humanitarian supplies to Gaza.
“Many of us that have visited the occupied territories in Palestine have only come back with one conclusion: that the Palestinians are experiencing a far worse form of apartheid than we ever experienced,” Mandela told Reuters.
“We believe that the global community has to continue supporting the Palestinians, just as they stood side-by-side with us,” he said.
Mandela emphasized that when the apartheid in his country ended in 1994, it was after intense pressure and sanctions from other nations.
“They isolated apartheid
South
Africa and finally collapsed it. We believe that the time has come for that to be done for the Palestinians,” he said.
Source: Palestinian Information Center
