Algeria Expels the Zionist Entity’s Delegation From the AU Assembly

Algeria intervened to expel a delegation of the Zionist entity, headed by the Deputy Director of Africa at the Foreign Ministry of the occupation, Sharon Bar-li, accompanied by its ambassador to Addis Ababa, after they tried to sneak into the hall hosting the works of the 36th ordinary session of the African Union assembly in the Ethiopian capital, February 18, 2023, using entry cards that were granted for other participants, but the Algerian delegation noticed this violation of the AU regulations and asked, along with the South African representatives at the presidency of the African Union to expel them.

The Israeli delegation claimed that it had an invitation to attend the opening session of the African Union summit, given that its country holds the observer status, but they could not prove that, and as a result, the security of the hall forced them to leave and expelled them from the hall in compliance with the demands of Algeria, which asked the president of the union to remove the delegation, as a condition for opening the session or to cancel the summit if they remain in the hall.

The Zionist occupation’s government admitted to the world that Algeria was behind the expulsion of its diplomats, in a statement by its Foreign Ministry, saying explicitly that Algeria and South Africa are behind the incident in which Bar-li was expelled despite “her status as an observer with access badges”, indicating that it takes this incident seriously.

The expulsion incident came at a time when the Palestinian Prime Minister, Mohammad Shtayyeh, was sitting on the main podium at the opening session of the African Union summit in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, and was warmly received by African leaders and delivered the speech of the State of Palestine.

This is the second expulsion of the Zionist entity from the African Union after Algeria succeeded on the eve of the summit, accompanied by the State of South Africa, in preventing it from attending by cancelling an invitation sent by the Union Commission to Israel for the opening session, after pressure exerted by Algeria, Johannesburg and their allies on the continent to block the occupation from participating in any AU activity.

In the same context, the Secretary-General of the League of Arab States, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, warned, during his speech at the session, of the dangers of the Zionist entity entering the union, saying that it is not right to grant the government of Israel observer status in the African Union to reward the occupying power with normalization or by concluding cooperation and partnership agreements that go beyond peace agreements and normalization.

Algeria was able to write off the programming of studying the issue of the observer status that was granted to the Zionist entity from the agenda, because the Group of Seven countries that were formed last year to consider the issue did not meet and did not submit any report for discussion by African heads of state and government during this summit, according to what was reported by Echoroukonline.

On the other hand, the Senegalese President, the Chairman of the African Union, Macky Sall, affirmed, at the opening of the summit, the continent’s commitment to finding a peaceful solution to the Palestinian issue, based on the two-state solution, asserting that Palestine has the right to obtain its state.

For his part, the Prime Minister of the State of Palestine, Mohammad Shtayyeh, thanked Algeria for what it had done to reunite the Palestinian brothers, denouncing “the rushing of some Arab parties towards normalization with the Zionist occupier.”

He considered his country’s invitation to attend the continent’s leaders’ summit “a message that Africa stands by the inalienable national rights of the Palestinian people,” adding that African leaders “confirm through this platform that they are with Palestine, which has always been on the same front with African liberation movements.” Addressing them saying: “We are following the same path that Africa took in confronting the colonial forces and defeating the apartheid system based on discrimination and hatred. Today, we stand in the face of the Zionist settler occupation, which, through its new extremist government, practices a new form of violence, considered more severe and more dangerous than terrorism.”