Southern Africa immigrants welcomed at Western Wall

By Raphael Ahren

 April 23rd 2009

Eighty new immigrants from southern Africa received their Israeli identity cards at a welcoming ceremony at the Western Wall. They were the first immigrants to do so, in a special gesture by the Interior Ministry. 

 

"Although we have left our African homes with sadness and will forever have love for Africa in our hearts, we have at last arrived in our homeland - a place in which we have a right to belong, where we count not as colonialists or invaders but as citizens," said new arrival Amanda Cohen, 37, of Zimbabwe, in a speech. 

 

Some of the immigrants had participated in the South African presidential elections, whose outcome is still unclear. But the predicted landslide victory of Jacob Zuma - recently cleared on corruption and rape charges - was on many immigrants' minds, even as they received their plastic-enveloped ID cards and listened to speeches saying they were fulfilling biblical prophecies. 

 

"The political uncertainty certainly played a role in my decision to leave," said Tony Woods, 28, who used to own a plumbing business in Cape Town and will now start studying Hebrew at Kibbutz Ein Hashofet. 

 

"I don't want South Africa to become another Zimbabwe, that's why I voted against Zuma," he added, showing his thumbnail, which was colored red at the polls. "But then again, I no longer care so much about South Africa - it's not my country anymore."