Since 1994 I have visited South Africa many times for lecture tours. On some occasions I was brought by my publishers to do national media tours on my books on marriage and relationships. On other occasions I was a guest of the Jewish community to address eroding support for Israel in an otherwise staunchly Zionist community. I have watched this incredible country evolve from the end of apartheid when I first arrived to the multi-ethnic, harmonious society which has become an inspiration to the world.
I have also watched the standing of the State of Israel slowly devolve as more and more South Africans accept the superficial comparison of Israel as an apartheid state. The popularity I have been fortunate to earn in South African media as a promoter of the family – and few continents love family as much as Africa – has allowed me to emerge as a credible defender of Israel explaining that we Jews, as the Christian Bible makes clear, are analogous to Black South Africans as the indigenous people of the Holy Land who were invaded by a white, oppressive, European, colonial power who destroyed our temple, murdered us, and exiled us from our land. For two thousand years we have prayed to return, never losing contact with our soil. And now that we have come back and rebuilt our country, we granted equal citizenship to our Arab brothers and sisters who came to the land over the centuries in our absence, when we Jews were forcibly denied entry, and who have, even more so, come to Israel over the past century as Zionist pioneers have made the country more habitable and prosperous.
