Staff Reporter
President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday said he was mourning the death of Leila Shahid, a Lebanese-born Palestinian diplomat and activist who became the first woman to serve as Palestine’s ambassador abroad.
Shahid died in France on Wednesday, aged 76.
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In a statement issued by the South African presidency, Ramaphosa said Shahid’s death was “a moment of sadness” for people around the world who remain in solidarity with Palestinians.
“The passing of Leila Shahid is a moment of sadness that ripples from the ruins of a brutalised Palestine to places all over the world where we remain resolute in our solidarity with the people of Palestine in their struggle for freedom,” Ramaphosa said.
He said Shahid had spent decades drawing international attention to the conflict and that “as an anthropologist, she sought to preserve the cultural history of the people of Palestine”.
“Leila Shahid leaves us while the State of Israel perpetuates the excessive violence and disregard of international law that Leila witnessed, fought against and brought to the attention of the international community during her decades of activism,” he said.
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Shahid was born in Beirut in 1949 to Palestinian parents and later moved to Paris for postgraduate studies in anthropology.
She was appointed by the Palestine Liberation Organisation to Ireland in 1989, becoming the first woman to hold the post of Palestinian ambassador, and later served in the Netherlands.
From the early 1990s to the mid-2000s, she was the Palestinian representative in France, before later serving as Palestine’s envoy to the European Union, Belgium and Luxembourg.
Shahid was with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat during his final days in a French military hospital in 2004.
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