Chaos as Africans attacked

Violent race riots that shook southern Tel Aviv overnight sparked shock in Israel yesterday but also prompted top-level calls for the immediate arrest and expulsion of tens of thousands of African migrants.

The latest unrest to sweep the impoverished neighbourhoods around Tel Aviv's central bus station erupted when a demonstration by about 1000 people, protesting against the rising number of Africans moving into the area, turned violent.

"Shock, violence and hatred of foreigners in Tel Aviv" was the headline in the Maariv daily, which described scenes of chaos as demonstrators went on the rampage with sticks and stones, attacking African-run shops and smashing up a car driven by two African men.

"Blacks out," shouted demonstrators in the crowd, while others yelled: "Send the Sudanese back to Sudan."

Most reports said the rally turned nasty after the crowd was whipped up by several racist speeches from rightwing MPs, several of them from the ruling Likud party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

"The infiltrators are a cancer in our body," Likud MP Miri Regev told the crowd, as fellow MP Danny Danon shouted: "The infiltrators must be expelled from Israel! Expulsion now!"

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said 20 people had been arrested on suspicion. There were no reports of injuries.

Interior ministry statistics show there are more than 60000 African immigrants living illegally in Israel.

- Timeslive

Somali traders living in terror

Somali shop traders in Masiphumelele fear for their lives after a series of attacks over the past two months left more than eight critically injured.

“It’s horrible… we are facing a really scary time,” said Abdullahi Hussein Mohamed, a shop owner and spokesman for Somali traders in Masiphumelele.

He said that in the past, robbers would come inside their shops, point a gun and demand money. But now “they come to our shops and they just start shooting. People get shot at while they are sleeping,” he said.

Masiphumelele is between Kommetjie, Capri Village and Noordhoek.

“Although we are foreigners far from home, we are living within a community and we are supposed to help each other,” said Mohamed. “We are scared but we have no choice, our children have to be fed,” he said.

When the Cape Argus visited shop owner Therie Aman, 26, this week, he had just returned from Groote Schuur Hospital after being shot three times in his hand and chest. A bullet is still lodged in the middle of his chest. “I have to go back to the hospital in a few days… I am in pain and scared… but …I have to work.”

Aman said he and his partner, Abdul Qadir Hassan, were in the shop when two young men came in. One started shooting at them. “I spent more than three hours waiting for the police, lying on the floor,” he said.

Police spokesman Frederick van Wyk said they had arranged a number of meetings with the Somali shop owners and proposed that they close at 8pm. “Instead, they close at midnight,” said Van Wyk. He said that when incidents happened, they did not call the police immediately and that sometimes, the shop owners refused to open cases.

Around the corner from Aman’s shop is the store of Shurif Ali, 32, and his brother, Mustafa, 28. Two weeks ago, they were robbed and Mustafa was shot.

He had to have surgery at Groote Schuur to remove a bullet in his chest. He was discharged yesterday.

“Last Saturday they shot at us and while my brother was lying on the floor, they took about R2 000 from the till. Now we close earlier, but… they come during the day, too,” he said.

Ali said they had stopped reporting the incidents to the police because they didn’t get any feedback.

- Cape Argus