On June 4, The New America Foundation welcomed Sasha Polakow- Suransky, the author of The Unspoken Alliance, and Tony Karon, Senior Editor at Time Magazine, to discuss Suranksky’s recent groundbreaking book on the South Africa- Israel relationship.

Suranksky’s book uncovered and exposed the before- hidden history of the relationship between Israel and South Africa that occurred largely in the 1970s-1980s. The basis of the relationship between the two countries lied in their military cooperation, joint nuclear testing, and transfer and coordination of military technology.

The United States’ criticism of Israel and South Africa is similar in that it is upset with certain policies within both countries, but tacitly allows them to continue. This creates a vacuum in which civil society groups in Israel and South Africa must force their governments to take action against the unpopular policies in their countries.

Contemporary comparisons between Israel and South Africa are centered on the argument that Israel is today what South Africa was during apartheid. While the political geography of the two countries is very different, Karon highlighted that there is a moral equivalence between Israel and South Africa, which is that people are living under a regime in which they have no democratic rights.