As a warning to other countries, Washington’s ouster of Ambassador Ebrahim Rasool may well backfire, writes Medea Benjamin.
Elon Musk, President Donald Trump and a Tesla outside the White House on March 11. (White House/Flickr)
By Medea Benjamin
Common Dreams
On March 14, Secretary of State Marco Rubio publicly berated South Africa’s Ambassador to the U.S. Ebrahim Rasool in a most undiplomatic tweet, writing:
“South Africa’s Ambassador to the United States is no longer welcome in our great country. Ebrahim Rasool is a race-baiting politician who hates America and hates @POTUS. We have nothing to discuss with him and so he is considered PERSONA NON GRATA.”
On Sunday, March 23, the South African ambassador returned home to a hero’s welcome.
The United States lost a seasoned South African representative who had previously served as his country’s ambassador during Barack Obama’s presidency; was a member of South Africa’s National Assembly; and was active (and imprisoned) during his country’s anti-apartheid struggle.
Ginning up conflict with a country that has such tremendous international standing may prove to be a bad move for President Donald Trump.
The Trump administration was incensed by remarks the ambassador had made earlier that week when speaking, via video, at a conference in South Africa. He commented on the MAGA movement, saying that it is driven by white supremacy and is a response to the growing demographic diversity in the United States.
The ambassador also expressed concern about the movement’s global reach, including support from Elon Musk, who was born in South Africa and has connections with extreme right movements overseas. The ambassador called his nation, South Africa, “the historical antidote to supremacism.”
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said the decision to expel Rasool was “regrettable” and that “South Africa remains committed to building a mutually beneficial relationship with the United States.”
Ambassador Rasool, who says he has no regrets, was greeted by a massive crowd as he landed in Cape Town.
Rasool in 2013 at tribute to the memory of Nelson Mandela organized by the Organization of American States. (OEA – OAS / Flickr/ CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Rasool’s expulsion is only the latest manifestation of U.S. displeasure with South Africa.
On March 17, U.S. State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce listed a litany of issues the U.S. has with South Africa, including its “unjust land appropriations law;” its growing relationship with Russia and Iran; and the fact that it accused Israel of genocide in the International Court of Justice.
Bruce denounced the ambassador’s lack of decorum, which she called obscene, and painted South Africa as a country whose policies make the United States and the entire world less safe.
This is in stark contrast to the view of South Africa from the Global South, where the African nation’s foreign policy is often seen as exemplary. Since the end of apartheid in 1994, the ruling African National Congress (ANC) has embraced a non-aligned foreign policy and has tried to resist pressure from Western countries.
South Africa has also continued to show appreciation for nations such as Russia, Cuba and Iran that supported its anti-apartheid struggle.
South Africa’s non-aligned stance became a bone of contention with the Biden administration after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The United States pushed the world community to condemn Russia, but South Africa, along with many African nations, refused to take sides.
South Africa has long had warm relations with Russia, dating back to the days when the Soviet Union trained and supported many of the ANC freedom fighters. Instead of condemning Russia, South Africa led a group of six African nations to advocate for negotiations to end the Russia/Ukraine conflict.
Collision Course Over Gaza
Some of South Africa’s legal team in January 2024, at the International Court of Justice during Pretoria’s genocide case against Israel. (ICJ)
But it was Israel’s war on Gaza that placed the United States and South Africa on a collision course. Far from supporting the U.S. ally, Israel, South Africa accused Israel of committing genocide against the Palestinians at the International Court of Justice.
The Biden administration denounced the case as “meritless, counterproductive, and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever,” but the case triggered an avalanche of global support for South Africa’s principled stand.
Dr. Haidar Eid, a Palestinian academic from Gaza, reflected world opinion when he said,
“By bravely standing up for what is right and taking Israel to the ICJ, South Africa showed us that another world is possible: a world where no state is above the law, most heinous crimes like genocide and apartheid are never accepted and the peoples of the world stand together shoulder to shoulder against injustice. Thank You, South Africa.”
When Trump regained the White House, he not only condemned South Africa for its ICJ case against Israel, but he became embroiled in a policy totally internal to the African nation.
Most likely egged on by Elon Musk, Trump denounced South Africa’s Expropriation Act of 2025, which established a program to expropriate unused agricultural land that White owners refused to sell to Black purchasers.
White South Africans [Afrikaners and English speakers, such as Musk’s family] controlled the oppressive apartheid government until it was overthrown in 1994, and Afrikaners continue to own the vast majority of the wealth (the typical Black household owns 5 percent of the wealth held by the typical White household).
But Trump called the White population “racially disfavored landowners” and shockingly, not only punished South Africa by cutting off U.S. aid, but also promoted “the resettlement of Afrikaner refugees escaping government-sponsored race-based discrimination.”
While shutting U.S. doors to immigrants of color from around the world, Trump laid out the red carpet for Afrikaners. Little wonder Ambassador Rasool was moved to call the Trump administration a leader in white supremacy.
Punishing Aid Cuts
Visitors around the Nelson Mandela statue outside The Unions Building, seat of South Africa’s executive branch in Pretoria, 2013. (South African Tourism/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)
Trump’s decision to cut aid to South Africa coincides with the administration’s gutting of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which has had a disastrous effect on South Africans suffering from HIV/AIDS. The President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) was a U.S. program launched in 2003 by President George W. Bush to provide life-saving HIV care and treatment.
South Africa has one of the highest rates of HIV in the world, and the U.S. had contributed 17 percent of the nation’s $400 million HIV budget. This funding supported the anti-retroviral medication for HIV treatment of 5.5 million people annually. According to some estimates, the aid freeze could cause over half a million deaths in South Africa over the next decade.
In terms of the larger South African economy and possible fallout from U.S. cuts, the United States is South Africa’s second-largest export market (China is No. 1), with $14.7 billion worth of goods exported to the United States in 2024. South Africa also benefits from the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a preferential trade program providing duty-free access to U.S. markets. If the Trump administration removes South Africa from AGOA eligibility, its exports will surely plummet.
To make matters worse, this week the U.S. stopped the disbursement of $2.6 billion to South Africa through the World Bank’s Climate Investment Fund, monies that are supposed to help South Africa transition from coal to cleaner energy sources.
The Trump administration’s tough stance on South Africa is certainly meant to warn other countries about the consequences of challenging the United States. But Trump’s actions may well backfire.
In response to the cut-off in aid and trade, 100 parliamentarians from around the world penned a letter calling on their own governments to support South Africa’s public health programs and to expand new avenues for international trade as a sign of “international solidarity with the South African people as they face this assault on their right to self-determination.”
South Africa is also a key player in the growing alliance of BRICs, a grouping of large countries trying to counter the economic clout of the United States. The BRICs nations now represent roughly 45 percent of the world’s populations and 35 percent of global GDP.
Trump’s expulsion and threats have also had a unifying effect inside South Africa. Ambassador Rasool, who says he has no regrets, was greeted by a massive crowd as he landed in Cape Town. For the people of South Africa and worldwide who oppose white supremacy, Rasool is not a disgraced ambassador. He is a hero.
Medea Benjamin is the co-founder of CODEPINK and the co-founder of the human rights group Global Exchange. She has been an advocate for social justice for more than 40 years. She is the author of 10 books, including Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote Control; Kingdom of the Unjust: Behind the US-Saudi Connection; and Inside Iran: The Real History and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Her articles appear regularly in outlets such as Znet, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, CommonDreams, Alternet and The Hill.
This article is from Common Dreams.
Views expressed in this article and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
As far as the Rasool saga is concerned, I listened to his pronouncement. Well, if he had been a private citizen he would have had the right of an absolute freedom of expression. Being an ambassador one must be more thoughtful when engaging in any public discussion.
Do you mean, like Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and his cohort?
What I appreciate about this commentary is that besides exposing the cynicism of US behaviour vis-a-vis South Africa, it also details the constructive response of South Africa and of people from other countries to this monstrous behaviour. I wish more people would realize that mere outrage — however brilliantly expressed — is not an adequate, healthy, or constructive response to the various appalling initiatives of the current US administration.
So, in your opinion, what do you think would be peoples more adequate, healthy and constructively forceful responses to actions of raw, unilateral, unbridled, hegemonic displays of coercive international power than an ambassador speaking out as an accredited representative of his governments point of view?
It’s okay for Secretary of State, Marco Rubio to go forth, abroad, and speak-out stupidly against policies of other countries he visits; ridiculously mouthing and spouting “his masters (broken) voice”, as foolhardy as it is, representing U.S. foreign policy interests?
Amazing how this piece is couched in such racist terms. White versus Black.
One could instead of the racial arguments make a fairness argument. Make a class-based argument. That it is unfair and wrong for an established land-owning class to control all the land. That’s a different argument to make about this situation. I find it very interesting that CodePink and the modern left choose to go with racism as a basis of argument. Its “White South Africans” versus “Black Households.” It is not couched in Land-Owning Upper Class versus Struggling Farmers.
While I agree with nearly all stated here, and often do with Ms Benjamin, I find the use of the term “White Supremicist” highly objectionable and suspect. It is a leftist propagandist term whenever used in relation to the non-minority White population of the United States. Like it or not they are still the largest demographic in the country and with the associated voting power. They have no reason under the sun to give that up on the alter of open borders or diversity or any other thing in our form of democracy. The use of that term by the SA ambassador seems to expose a very negative view of our majority population. White Majority-ist may be a more appropriate and accurate term than “white supremicist” in all but a rare case. Had that term not been used, I would have remained more sympathetic to his personal situation.
Putin may once have had to be politically ruthless, a necessity at the time, after what the U.S. State had attempted to do to the Russian people, immediately after the implosion of the USSR. A Russian patriot had to bring the country back from the precipice of U.S. greed mongering interference in Russian internal affairs.
Yet he is not a general narcissist; more importantly, he is not a malignant narcissist, as is Trump, who cares not a whit for the broader American population, as much as he cares for himself, and his own image.
[Google’s AI Overview has a good explanation of the differences between Putin and Trump. (For sound grounding, a good idea to read)
Does the following ring any bells for anyone?
A “ruthless narcissist,” often referred to as a malignant narcissist, exhibits behaviors that are more extreme and harmful than those of a typical narcissist, including a higher degree of manipulation, exploitation, lack of empathy, and sadistic tendencies, often causing significant emotional harm and destruction of relationships.
Here’s a breakdown of the behavioral differences:
Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) Traits (General Narcissist):
Grandiose Sense of Self-Importance: An inflated sense of their own importance, achievements, and talents.
Need for Admiration: A constant craving for attention, praise, and validation from others.
Lack of Empathy: Difficulty understanding or caring about the feelings and needs of others.
Exploitative Behavior: Tendency to take advantage of others to fulfill their own needs and desires.
Sense of Entitlement: Believing they deserve special treatment and that rules don’t apply to them.
Envy of Others: Feeling envious of others’ accomplishments or possessions, or believing others are envious of them.
Arrogant and Haughty Behavior: Displaying an attitude of superiority and condescension towards others.
Malignant Narcissist (Ruthless Narcissist) Traits (In Addition to NPD Traits):
Sadistic Tendencies: Taking pleasure in hurting or controlling others.
Antisocial Traits: Displaying behaviors that are harmful, aggressive, and law-breaking.
Paranoia: Being overly suspicious and mistrustful of others.
Deceitfulness: Lying, manipulating, and scheming to achieve their goals.
Lack of Remorse: Showing no guilt or regret for their actions, even when they cause harm.
Vindictiveness: Seeking revenge and causing harm to those they perceive as having wronged them.
Destructive Relationships: Intentionally damaging or destroying relationships for personal gain or pleasure.
Gaslighting: Manipulating others into doubting their own sanity or reality.
Exploitation: Using and discarding others without regard for their feelings or well-being.
Aggression: Displaying verbal or physical aggression towards others.
Blame Projection: They never take responsibility, and it’s always someone else’s fault.
Sabotage: Sabotaging the relationships and friendships of others for their own personal entertainment.]
For followers unable to accept AI Overviews, refer to ‘family’ Psychologist, Mary Trump on YouTube, for further details on what ‘we’ (the World) are going to have to deal with, a little further down the road than 60-odd days of travel down this road of oblivion.
It’s like comparing the pitch-black darkness of night and the bright light of day.
Americans’ ideas of Putin are that he is politically ruthless, while having no first-hand experience of the man. He is ruthless, because that is what the American narrative they have imbibed, without a second’s thought, has been drummed into thick skulls, for too many years.
Despite the aforementioned precise break-down, and appropriate psychological classification of his personality characteristics; experiencing as witnesses, first-hand his actions in tearing up the American Constitution, with his supercilious, Authoritarian, Autocratic aplomb; creating Executive orders and forcing them through in practice, extra-judicially, daring anyone to challenge HIS presidency.
Citing an afterthought from someone other than myself, perhaps it is rightfully attributed to Mark Twain:
“A pessimist is simply an optimist with experience”.
I agree with the first 2 comments.
Trump and his cabinet all need to be in prison Musk included. This destruction of our country and our relationships with other countries has to stop.
You carried a sign that said “Mission not accomplished”. What mission was not accomplished that should have been?
Trump’s Genocidal America will end up rather isolated. World revulsion at what is happening in Gaza, no matter how much US soft-power tries to deny it, will lead this direction. This will of course be under-reported on the American news. Trump’s Trade Wars will also lead to this. Trump appears to be trying to anger and drive away the European based Capitalist West that was willing to look the other way from Gaza to rake in capitalist profits given the traditional European values towards both profits and genocides.
South Africa is going to be in a big club. Between this and their being the nation to file the Genocide charge against Israel, they are likely to be the popular belle of that big club. America’s club will basically be only the nations that the Gawdfather can coerce into staying in their little tiny club. And this isn’t really a new trend. Biden was already leading America in that direction. Trump has only put his foot on the gas while giving the rest of the world the finger out the window.
There is going to be a large, multi-polar world, with its concurrent large trade bloc. America is going to be outside of this, officially when the rest of the world is so much stronger that they begin to sanction the Americans. It will be interesting to look at the photos of the world leaders when that occurs to see how well they are hiding their impulse to grin at how things worked out.
BTW, I said Trump’s, but this has truly been a bi-partisan effort. This course has been set since Reagan, and if elections could change anything important, they’d be illegal.
Just a small correction, most of the wealth in South Africa is actually in the hands of English speaking white South Africans. The group Mr. Musk hails from.
Vengeance…pure vengeance…This is what Trump’s regime consists of.
Vengeance…pure vengeance…This is what America consists of.
This is the nature of modern American politics. Justice has been redefined into the comic book version where justice means retribution. Dr. King was speaking of something different when he connected justice with peace. Every faction in American politics is demanding an eye for past injuries, and does not care if this leaves the whole world blind as long as they get to say that they got theirs.
Keep in mind the political platform that Trump defeated consisted of a slogan of “Hate Trump” and a movement that demands reparations. We are not exactly talking about people preaching de-escalation and non-violence and lets all share what we’ve got because we’ve got plenty and it will be a good time together.
Time to impeach Trump. Essentially gutless for meaningful things – like truth and compassion -he overcompensates with flash and trash violence. Could he possibly think
his insecurity is not visible for all to see? And when he does his rooster prance and dance, everyone – when they get over their repulsion and pity – are left with disgust?
The constitution is the highest law in the land. The lawyers of that era put in a clause to say so, of course. The President can be impeached for “high crimes and misdemeanors”. A high crime must include openly breaking the highest law in the land.
Someone should have filed an impeachment motion the day Trump signed the order directly contradicting the words of the Constitution about how everyone born in America is an American citizen. President’s might try to challenge the Constitution more subtly, mainly by trying to pass a law that may or may not stand constitutional muster. But for a President to sign an order that is in open and direct contradiction to the Constitution of the United States has to be an impeachable offense.
I saw a picture that showed that Trump avoided putting his hand on the Bible when he swore to uphold and defend the Constitution. Then again, anything can be fake. And I’m quite certain that Trump is not afraid of God as he shows that every day.
Too bad the opposition is the wealthy, gutless, all mouth, no fight Democrats. We the people fought a Civil War to get that into the Constitution. A lot of American Patriots shed blood and died to get that into the Constitution. Its worth defending.
Of course, it was the Democrats that we had to defeat back in the day to get that into the Constitution. I guess I’m not really shocked that they defend that as little as they defend the New Deal or anything else the people have won.