Naledi Pandor, former South African foreign minister, has said Muslims are ‘permitted to engage in jihad when necessary’
The South African official who spearheaded a case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), arguing it was guilty of genocide, is scheduled to enter the United States on Thursday. The official, Naledi Pandor, spoke by phone with former Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh shortly after Oct. 7, 2023, and has supported Islamist terrorism.
Pandor, a convert to Islam, has professed her support for terrorism on numerous occasions. “We as Muslims, we are a peaceful people,” she said during an event in Cape Town in September. “But we are permitted to engage in jihad when necessary.”
She told an audience last month that “armed struggle may become a necessity if there is no movement toward fundamental change.”
Pandor served as South African foreign minister from 2019 to 2024, leading the country’s lawfare campaign against Israel that culminated in a formal accusation of genocide in December 2023. She spent the preceding months making diplomatic rounds that took her to Tehran for meetings with top Iranian officials and to Hamas-friendly Qatar, according to the Times of Israel, which published an open letter on Monday calling on the Trump administration to revoke Pandor’s visa.
Just 10 days after Hamas’s attack against Israel, Pandor spoke on the phone with Haniyeh in a call she claimed had to do with getting humanitarian aid into Gaza. Hamas itself said Pandor called to offer her congratulations for the “Al-Aqsa Flood”—the terror group’s name for the attack—and her office eventually admitted that she “reiterated South Africa’s solidarity and support” for the Palestinian people during the conversation.
News of Pandor’s visit to the United States comes after a year in which the Trump administration has taken action against similar individuals. Secretary of State Marco Rubio expelled South African ambassador to the United States Ebrahim Rasool from the country over his claims that President Donald Trump was leading a white supremacist movement, and the State Department has revoked visas of Palestinian officials in part over their pursuit of legal charges against Israel at the ICJ. In June, the administration canceled visas for the British rap group Bob Vylan after the duo called for the murder of Israeli soldiers and the end of the Jewish state during a music festival.
A senior administration official told the Washington Free Beacon that Pandor’s leadership role in the ICJ case and support for terrorism may prevent her from entering the country.
“The State Department is aware of this individual’s pro-terrorism background,” the official said. “The matter is currently under review.”
Pandor is set to appear as the keynote speaker for Muslim Network Television’s Milwaukee premiere on Friday night, according to an online invitation. Organizers say that during the event, held at the Sheraton Milwaukee Brookfield, she will “support American Muslims in taking control of our own story by backing Muslim media.”
The Chicago-based Muslim media organization Sound Vision, which is known for disseminating anti-Israel propaganda accusing the Jewish state of genocide, is organizing the event. A poster celebrates how Pandor “led South Africa to sue Israel for genocide.”
“While leaders in the Muslim world remained inactive in preventing genocide in Gaza, Dr. Pandor, as South Africa’s foreign minister, brought Israel before the International Court of Justice for its acts of genocide against Palestinians,” the promotional materials state.
Pandor visited the United States earlier this year for an event with Council on American-Islamic Relations executive director Nihad Awad, who said he was “happy to see” the Oct. 7 attack. A Facebook invitation for that event states that “Dr. Pandor and South Africa stood up for the Ummah, and now it is our responsibility and our turn as Muslims to stand with, and honor her.”
A source briefed on the upcoming visit told the Free Beacon that the State Department and other executive branch officials became aware of Pandor’s trip soon after its announcement.
“Officials are aware of the concerns regarding Pandor’s conduct” and have discussed “the precedent for withholding a visa to someone who provided support and legitimacy to Hamas in the immediate aftermath of October 7,” the source said.
Nick Stewart, managing director of advocacy at FDD Action—an arm of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies—told the Free Beacon the fact that Pandor is no longer in government means she no longer enjoys any of the diplomatic benefits that come with holding an official position.
“She’s no longer a foreign minister, and there’s no reason the United States needs to abide by that fiction any longer,” Stewart said. “Someone like Pandor, who celebrates terrorism and works gleefully with our country’s adversaries, shouldn’t be welcomed to spread that message on American soil.”
