JOHANNESBURG, JAN 30: South Africa has declared Israel’s top diplomat in the country “persona non grata,” and given him 72 hours to leave, the foreign ministry said on Friday, citing a “series of violations”.

Ties between the two nations are already strained, with South Africa bringing a case before the United Nations top court in 2023 to argue that Israel’s war on Gaza, an illegally occupied Palestinian territory, amounted to genocide.

The Israeli government had been informed that its charge d’affaires, Ariel Seidman, has been “declared persona non grata” and “required to depart from the Republic within 72 hours”, the ministry said in a statement.

“This decisive measure follows a series of unacceptable violations of diplomatic norms and practice which pose a direct challenge to South Africa’s sovereignty,” it said.

They included “the repeated use of official Israeli social media platforms to launch insulting attacks” on President Cyril Ramaphosa.

The foreign ministry also accused the embassy of a “deliberate failure” to inform South Africa of “purported visits by senior Israeli officials”.