Desmond Tutu, former Archbishop of Cape Town and prominent leader of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa recently wrote: “I’ve been very deeply distressed in my visit to the Holy Land; it reminded me so much of what happened to us black people in South Africa. I have seen the humiliation of the Palestinians at checkpoints and roadblocks, suffering like us when young white police officers prevented us from moving about.”

Such comparisons undeniably ring true.

Where South African apartheid limited black Africans’ movement through humiliating “pass laws” which regulated where blacks were allowed to live, work and travel, Israeli apartheid constrains Palestinian freedoms through an extensive network of armed checkpoints and roadblocks which criss-cross Palestinian towns and villages.

Where South African apartheid employed dehumanising racist terminology, such as “Kaffir”, “boy” or “animal” to describe blacks, leaders of Israeli apartheid such as Menachim Begin in the 1980s referred to Palestinians as “two-legged beasts” and just last year Israeli Defence Force T-shirts encouraged their soldiers to shoot at pregnant Palestinian women: a barbarous attitude which reveals the racism which flourishes in Israel’s core.

Where South African apartheid terrorised the black population through States of Emergency which allowed the state to detain anyone without a hearing for up to six months (and while in prison they would be tortured and often killed), Israeli apartheid is currently holding around 7,500 Palestinians in prisons, often without trial, often for years at a time and often employing torture to cow and brutalise.

Where South African apartheid banned independent black trade unions, outlawed black political organising and arrested black African leaders, Israeli apartheid imposes deadly sanctions on Gaza for electing Hamas, attempts to ban pro-Palestinian parties inside the 1948 borders of Israel and has a secret service (Mossad) which regularly assassinates Palestinian political figures.

So the similarities are many and should be emphasised. They slice through the dominant rhetoric that claims Israel as a “civilised” regime in a sea of Arab backwardness or as a “democratic” nation fighting a brave and distinguished war against the “terrorist” Palestinian hordes. As we celebrate Nelson Mandela’s release from prison 20 years ago, we mustn’t forget that he and his compatriots in the freedom struggle were labelled as “terrorists” by governments across the world. Indeed, it was only in 2008 that Mandela was taken off the immigration watch list for possible “terrorists” in the USA, an embarrassing gaffe for a government that tries to pretend it didn’t back apartheid South Africa for decades.

Clearly there is much to recommend the comparisons made between South African and Israeli apartheid; unfortunately many of the comparisons made by activists today are restricted to commentary about the horrors of the two systems: and if there is any discussion about the solution there is rarely any mention of the role played by the South African black working class in overthrowing the regime. Such an oversight beggars belief given the scale, force and importance of the working class rebellion which mobilised millions of black workers from the mid-1970s onwards and managed to shake the very foundations of South African apartheid, and indeed South African capitalism.

How apartheid was overthrown in South Africa

Apartheid officially began in 1948 and it represented a strengthening and intensifying of many of the most discriminatory features of the South African economic, social and political system.

The central purpose of apartheid was to circumscribe and limit the emerging black working class, so as to allow the development of a super-profitable South African capitalism. The racial oppression was clearly tied into the development of the profit system. South African capitalism rested on the super-exploitation of the black workforce. In other words minority white profits rested on the labour of the black majority. This gave the black working class an immense economic power. One South African poet described them as “a coiled snake” – that when provoked could “bite the head off the system”.

The white ruling class recognised this power and used immense levels of state repression to crush any independent black working class organisation: independent black unions were banned until the 1980s and the Communist Party was banned from 1960 on.

For years much of this repression had the desired effect, and black workers attempting to organise unions were often beaten back. Of course, many also participated in the early anti-apartheid campaigns, such as those against the pass laws, and many also joined political organisations like the African National Congress, but it wasn’t until the early 1970s that the working class really independently exploded onto the scene.

1973 saw a series of largely spontaneous strikes in and around Durban. These strikes were largely successful, and workers in many workplaces managed to win recognition of their unions as well as a series of wage rises and workplace improvements. These gains may sound like nothing special to Australian ears, but for black workers who had been intimidated, beaten, shot at and even killed for organising meetings of one or two workers, these were great victories. The Durban strikes inspired workers across the country and saw a blossoming of working-class confidence, all of which culminated in the growth of a number of independent black trade unions. By 1985 these trade unions had established their own super federation, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) which encompassed 33 trade unions, representing 450,000 paid-up union members.

Such union organisation could not however ignore the reality of apartheid: basic shop floor struggles could not avoid the nature of the regime, with its vast repressive machinery and its complex legal oppressions. Police repression, the pass laws, the industrial relations framework and the group areas act all had a clear impact on how workers worked and lived. This led the union movement to see the necessity of challenging apartheid, as well as many thousands of workers coming to the conclusion that a challenge to apartheid required a challenge to the economic system which underpinned it: capitalism.

COSATU was massively more radical than most trade union federations today (leaders of the ACTU would blanch in horror reading COSATU’s program). They argued for workers’ control, socialism and wide-ranging internal democracy.

While students, the poor and the middle classes were reeling in the 1980s under the extensive repression of the State of Emergency which gave unprecedented powers to police and the military, the workers’ movement was continuing to grow in scale and determination. Workers in fast food restaurants, cleaners, miners and railway workers became involved and engaged in major industrial action of their own. Much of this action began to involve radical tactics, such as occupations of workplaces.

1987 saw the largest ever South African miners’ strike. At its height 340,000 miners at 44 coal and gold mines were out. The strike continued for almost a month and gathered a massive amount of community support. Workers in many other areas were militant and raring to go.

The situation was explosive – the characteristics of a revolutionary situation were all there.

The economy was under severe stress due to this industrial strife, and the white ruling class – within which cracks were starting to emerge – was having difficulty maintaining order.

The South African apartheid state had become a pariah on the world stage – partly because of a worldwide solidarity movement against apartheid and because the international ruling classes felt that the apartheid regime was becoming more hassle than it was worth. They wanted South Africa to settle down and become a properly functioning capitalist power without all the fuss and protest the regime was engendering.

There was also a real level of bitterness and a desire for change amongst the whole black population. Both the middle classes and the township poor were desperate for an end to apartheid. Riots were increasing in frequency and there was a clear sense that things couldn’t continue in the same way.

For the next three years, until Mandela’s release in February 1990, the movement continued. But it needs to be emphasised that it was the workers’ movement which had changed the rules of the game, which had given confidence to many community organisations, and which had genuinely unsettled the regime and forced them to move towards a negotiated settlement in the early 1990s.

It was the strength and power of the South African working class which destroyed one of the most brutal, abhorrent regimes in the history of the planet.

This is a key lesson for Palestinian liberation today. While it is true that within the confines of Palestine itself, in Gaza and the West Bank, the working class has been seriously battered (in Gaza for instance the majority of the population lives off aid) the Arab working class across the region remains economically strong. More and more of the population have become wage workers, concentrated in cities like greater Cairo (with over 15 million inhabitants).

Historically the people of the region identify strongly with the Palestinian cause. The economic strength of the Arab workers is the only force which has the capacity to challenge an apartheid regime like Israel: a regime which is much more vital to the strength of American imperialism than South Africa ever was.

If there is one political lesson to draw from the South African movement against apartheid it is this: it is only the economic might, militancy and revolutionary capacity of the working classes that wields a power strong enough to overthrow Israel, one of the 21st century’s most brutal regimes.