South Africa's parliament approved a bill submitted by the "National Freedom" party to reduce the country's diplomatic representation in Israel.
South Africa 's legislature has voted on a bill to reduce the country's diplomatic representation in Israel, Middle East Eye reports .
The “National Freedom” party presented the draft resolution, which provides for the downgrading of the South African embassy in Israel in light of the ongoing violations against the Palestinians.
The National Socialist Party issued a statement saying such a move would have been supported by the country's late anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela.
"This is a moment Mandela would be proud of," the statement read. "He always said our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians."
The statement indicated that Israel “was established by displacing, killing and maiming the Palestinians, and to maintain their grip on power, they established an apartheid regime to control and administer the Palestinians.”
"As South Africans, we refuse to stand by while apartheid is perpetrated yet again," he added.
South Africa established close relations with Israel during the apartheid era, but after the collapse of the discriminatory system, the African country began to lean towards Palestine.
And in 2019, South Africa downgraded its relations with Tel Aviv in response to its "deadly atrocities against the people of Gaza."
The move saw Pretoria reduce its diplomatic mission to a liaison office with limited functions, reinstate its ambassador, and refuse to return the envoy for four months.
In February, South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor hoped for "direct action" against the government in Tel Aviv for its "well-documented racist practices".
Also, last month, South Africa's ruling African National Congress party welcomed the "encouraging" expulsion of a senior Israeli diplomat from the African Union summit in Addis Ababa.
The incident saw an Israeli observer delegation to the African Union summit in the Ethiopian capital expelled from the opening ceremony, after representatives from South Africa and Algeria reportedly objected to the presence of diplomats from Israel.