{"id":33469,"date":"2017-03-27T08:44:19","date_gmt":"2017-03-27T08:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/kagame-hails-rwanda-israel-bond-at-aipac\/"},"modified":"2017-03-29T07:27:36","modified_gmt":"2017-03-29T07:27:36","slug":"kagame-hails-rwanda-israel-bond-at-aipac","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/kagame-hails-rwanda-israel-bond-at-aipac\/","title":{"rendered":"Kagame hails Rwanda-Israel bond at AIPAC"},"content":{"rendered":"

{Rwandan president says Jewish state\u2019s existence not an \u2018infringement\u2019 on others, highlights both countries as victims of genocide.}<\/p>\n

Rwanda\u2019s President Paul Kagame became the first African leader to address Washington\u2019s biggest pro-Israel forum Sunday, hailing the Jewish state as an inspiration for his own country\u2019s rebirth after genocide.<\/p>\n

Kagame was commander of RPF that put an end to the 1994 genocide against Tutsi and has led the country since 2000, as it recovers from the conflict and becomes a regional economic success story.<\/p>\n

In Washington to attend the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), he hailed the success of the State of Israel after the horrors of the Holocaust and pledged Rwanda\u2019s friendship.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe security of peoples who have once been targeted for extermination can never be exclusively physical,\u201d Kagame told the delegates, who received him with warm applause.<\/p>\n

\u201cUntil all ideologies which justify killing as a patriotic duty are defeated our world is not truly safe. Not for us, not for anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s relations with African governments have not always been easy.<\/p>\n

Some African political movements saw their own struggles against colonial rule reflected in the Palestinian fight for statehood \u2014 and many remember Israel\u2019s military support for South Africa\u2019s former apartheid regime.<\/p>\n

But Israel has an active diplomatic engagement on the continent and has won friends through economic and technical cooperation with major players like Rwanda.<\/p>\n

{{\u2018Reckless efforts\u2019}}<\/p>\n

Last year, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toured four African countries \u2014 including Rwanda \u2014 and in October he is expected to meet around 30 leaders at an Israel-Africa summit in Togo.<\/p>\n

Kagame visited Israel in 2008 and made clear at AIPAC that he sees the country as a friend and ally, rejecting what he sees as efforts in some quarters to delegitimatize Israeli statehood.<\/p>\n

\u201cTogether with friends like the United States, we must call for renewed global solidarity against the reckless efforts to deny genocide and to trivialize the victims,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsrael has the right to exist and thrive as a full member the international community. This is not an infringement of the rights of any other people,\u201d he declared.<\/p>\n

In 2014, when Rwanda sat on the United Nations Security Council, Kigali abstained from a resolution that advocated for the end of Israel\u2019s presence in the West Bank but was ultimately rejected.<\/p>\n

US President Donald Trump\u2019s new administration has so far proved more sympathetic to Israel\u2019s ambitions, and both Rwanda and Israel hope for warm relations.<\/p>\n

\"Rwandan<\/figure>\n

{{Source:Times of Israel with slight edits }} <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{Rwandan president says Jewish state\u2019s existence not an \u2018infringement\u2019 on others, highlights both countries as victims of genocide.} Rwanda\u2019s President Paul Kagame became the first African leader to address Washington\u2019s biggest pro-Israel forum Sunday, hailing the Jewish state as an inspiration for his own country\u2019s rebirth after genocide. Kagame was commander of RPF that put […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[72,75],"byline":[160],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-33469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-featured-news-home","tag-homenews","byline-theophile-niyitegeka"],"bylines":[{"id":160,"name":"Th\u00e9ophile Niyitegeka","slug":"theophile-niyitegeka","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":3}],"contributors":[{"id":160,"name":"Th\u00e9ophile Niyitegeka","slug":"theophile-niyitegeka","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":3}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33469\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33469"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=33469"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=33469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}