Milton Shain
Fascists, Fabricators and Fantasists: Antisemitism in South Africa: 1948 to the Present
Summary
Milton Shain looks at the mutation of anti-Jewish fantasies in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa, with a focus on alleged Jewish and Zionist conspiracies. In the ‘new South Africa’, a convergence of ‘progressive’ left and radical right fantasies is apparent, with Israel serving as the ‘collective’ Jew and a locus of global evil.
Milton Shain
Milton Shain is emeritus professor of historical studies at the University of Cape Town. He has written, co-authored, and co-edited over a dozen books on South African Jewish history, South African politics, and the history of antisemitism, including The Roots of Antisemitism in South Africa (1994), Antisemitism (1998); The Jews in South Africa: An Illustrated History, co-authored with Richard Mendelsohn (2008); A Perfect Storm: Antisemitism in South Africa, 1930–1948 (2015), and Holocaust Scholarship: Personal Trajectories and Professional Interpretations, co-edited with Christopher Browning, Susannah Heschel, and Michael Marrus (2015). In 2014 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of South Africa. Milton’s latest book, Fascists, Fabricators and Fantasists: Antisemitism in South Africa from 1948 to the Present (2023), is the final volume in his trilogy on the history of antisemitism in South Africa.
That’s a very good question. You know, all the findings are usually the surveys, peripherally touch on these things. There could be a sense of respect for Jewish entrepreneurship. I certainly think at a subtle level this has dampened the Afrikaner’s attitudes towards Jews as they’ve moved into the middle class and gained respect for that. But in terms of hard measurement, I can’t answer that.
Well, I don’t think it’s ever been formally denounced, but the level of hostility, particularly of late, is such that when the Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng, a deep committed Christian, took part in a webinar with the “Jerusalem Post” a couple of years ago, he was castigated from the highest levels, including the foreign minister, for doing this. And he was, you know, sorry to use the word, he was almost crucified by the popular sort of ANC media, but formally telling people not to go there. We have all the time, the issue of some people going for a Miss Universe contest or sports competition, it’s a hot issue and there’s a wall-to-wall hostility towards Zionism in the country, a wall-to-wall hostility among the chattering class. And yet, the Pew survey of 2007, the only one measuring attitudes, showed that about 43% supported the Israeli Jews, far less than that 27% the Arab cause and the rest didn’t know and didn’t care. That’s quite interesting because the chattering class give a very different impression.
Yes, it wasn’t a great haven, Southwest Africa, the neighbour, was more so, but there were lower level people who came here and then you had the odd Neo-Nazi visiting. I mentioned Louis Weichardt, the leader of the Greyshirts, he actually entertained a very prominent Nazi, Selezny, I don’t want to mispronounce his name, but he had been prominent in the SS and came to our parliament to have a cup of tea with Weichardt, who had become a senator, by the way, under the National Party.