Zionism, South Africa and Apartheid: The Paradoxical Triangle

Abstract

The Nationalist Party and Anti-Semitism, 1930-1947 Considering the anti-Semitic record of the Nationalist Party in South Africa in the years preceding its electoral victory of 1948, Keppel-Jones's prediction about the same time of an officially sanctioned pogrom in 19561 appeared to many as fully consistent with the Nationalist record. It was, after all, as recently as 1930 that Dr. Daniel F. Malan introduced his immigration quota bill restricting immigration from Eastern Europe. This bill, fathered by the man destined to lead the Nationalist Party to victory in 1948, was adopted as the Quota Act of 1930 and effectively reduced immigration from Eastern Europe to a trickle. When Hitler's attacks upon German Jewry led to the immigration of several thousand German Jews, Nazi-inspired elements within the Nationalist Party openly advocated that South Africa adopt similar measures. Dr. Hendrik F. Verwoerd, Malan's close associate and eventual successor as prime minister, also launched his political career in the same period of antiSemitic outpourings. One of Verwoerd's first political actions was to lead a deputation to Prime Minister Hertzog to ask that he refuse admission to refugees.2 In 1936 an Aliens Act instituted a new system of controlling immigration which in effect meant that until the end of the War no more than fifty Jews per year entered the country. The blatant anti-Semitic policy of the Nationalist Party continued until 1945. Through its attacks on Jewish democracy and Jewish capitalism the Party clearly indicated that Jews were not far behind kafirs in terms of its defined prejudices. During this period some Afrikaners favored the disfranchisement of all un-assimilable groups and Jews were specifically included in this category. Rarely was a person of background admitted to the Nationalist Party and through its recognized organ, Die Transvaler, edited by Verwoerd, the Jewish imperialistic war machine and immigration were attacked. The antiJewish policies of the Nationalist Party were officially proclaimed in its election manifesto of 1938 and reaffirmed three years later. Not even the defeat of Nazi Germany in April, 1945, brought an immediate end to Nationalist support of Nazi principles.3