South Africa’s national trade union centre, COSATU, has issued a May Day statement to a conference that’s building trade union support for the campaign of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) targeting Israel.

COSATU’s statement refers to “the growing brutality of the racist Israeli apartheid regime” — though without giving any evidence of this.  (Actually, in recent years there’s been a considerable easing of the occupation, with fewer roadblocks and a far lower level of violence in the occupied West Bank.)

But COSATU is not interested in the facts, apparently.  In its view, “in many ways South Africa’s apartheid regime pales” when compared to what the Jewish state does.

T0 anyone who knows anything at all about apartheid, or who struggled actively against it, this is an outrageous statement.  It diminishes the horror of apartheid in the same way as those who write about a “holocaust” in Gaza diminish the actual Nazi Holocaust.

Trade unions have the right — even the duty — to combat injustice anywhere in the world.  This includes criticizing Israeli government policies and showing solidarity with workers and their unions in Israel and Palestine.  But this does not justify wild exaggerations.

Apartheid, comrades, was considerably worse than this.  And you know this better than anyone.

The statement repeats COSATU’s belief that such a boycott must not only focus on goods produced in the Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, or even on goods produced in Israel, but should also include a boycott of Israeli unions. Here is what they say:

“We support and will further the position that as long as the Israeli trade union federation, Histadrut, does not clearly stand up against Israeli apartheid and occupation, it cannot be exempt from the call to boycott Israel and its institutions.”

COSATU seems unaware of the fact that the call to boycott the Histadrut has been explicitly rejected by the Palestinian unions.

COSATU’s statement gives concrete examples of what the powerful union federation has done, or intends to do, other than issue statements. These are:

• SATAWU has been at the forefront of dockworker actions blockading Israeli ships
• SAMWU is currently campaigning for the nationwide establishment of Israeli-apartheid-free municipalities
• NEHAWU supported the recent (and successful) campaign for the University of Johannesburg to boycott Israel’s Ben-Gurion University

Considering how powerful COSATU is, and its key role in the tripartite alliance with the African National Congress and the South African Communist Party (which together govern the country), these are not impressive results so far.

But at least they have had some success inside South Africa, unlike their experience trying to persuade unions in other countries to follow the same path.

COSATU says it’s not giving up on trying to get the international trade union movement to endorse its anti-Israel campaigns: “we will also work with Palestinian and international comrades to establish BDS as a policy within the ITUC,” they say. And this despite the abysmal failure of COSATU in 2010 to move the ITUC away from its support for engagement and for a two-state solution.

Fortunately, unions in most countries are ignoring COSATU’s call to boycott Israel and its trade unions.