Netanyahu looks to changing Africa for new Israeli allies

Israel hopes as well to gain more diplomatic support from African nations at the various UN bodies, where it faces harsh criticism over its occupation of the West Bank and blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Warming ties

The Israeli-Arab conflict drove a wedge between African countries and the Jewish state in the 1960s.

Pressure from North African nations, accentuated by the 1967 and 1973 wars between Israel and its neighbours, led African states to drop their relations with the Jewish state.

Netanyahu’s brother Yonatan was killed in a July 1976 commando raid in Entebbe, Uganda, to free passengers aboard an Air France plane hijacked by Palestinians.

By the time the commandoes arrived, all non-Israeli passengers had been released by the hijackers, leaving about 100 Israelis and crew members aboard.

The hostages were freed in the raid but 20 Ugandan soldiers and seven hijackers were killed, along with several Ugandan citizens.

The lone casualty among the Israeli assault team was Netanyahu’s brother, who headed the operation.

Changes in diplomatic relations with parts of Africa began in the following decade, according to Aryeh Oded, who for years was an Israeli diplomat in African capitals and is now a researcher at the Hebrew University’s Truman Institute.

“Since 1982, the Africans realised they had made a mistake in cutting the ties,” he said. Israel, however, still feeling the sting of the snub, “didn’t have the desire to renew ties.”

But in recent years, Israel’s lack of progress in reaching peace with the Palestinians forced it to renew its African interests.

“Under Avigdor Lieberman, Israel renewed its interest in Africa, because there were difficulties with Europe and other places,” Oded said of the ultra-nationalist who as Netanyahu’s foreign minister between 2009-2015 visited Africa a number of times.