As a Black Ethiopian-African Jew and an Israeli, I watched the images of Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar in Somaliland with a mixture of pride and fury.
Pride, because Israel finally did what almost no other country on Earth has had the courage or moral clarity to do: treat Somaliland not as an embarrassing anomaly to be ignored, but as a partner worthy of direct diplomatic engagement. Fury, because the very international system that lectures the world about democracy and human rights – the United Nations (UN) and the African Union (AU) foremost among them – has left Somaliland in the diplomatic wilderness for more than three decades.
I am from East Africa. I am a Jew of Ethiopian origina, an Israeli citizen, an international educator, and a diplomacy expert. I know the cultures and political codes of this region. I know what it means when the “international community,” including the UN and the AU, turns its back on a people who chose peace in a sea of violence. Somaliland is not theoretical. It is a real place with real people who did the hardest thing a society can do after war and dictatorship. It disarmed, reconciled, and built institutions.
Since 1991, Somalilanders have held clan conferences, drafted a constitution, approved it in a referendum, and held multi-party elections. They have had peaceful transfers of power. Their streets are safer than those in many internationally recognized capitals. For over 30 years, they have behaved like a responsible state without being treated as one. And what have the UN and the AU done? Endless missions and communiqués about “Somalia’s territorial integrity,” while the functioning democracy in the north is told to wait indefinitely for a process that never moves.
UN, AU, diplomatic silence
The UN and AU speak of “supporting democracy” and “preventing state failure,” but when a Black African society actually succeeds in both, they reward it with diplomatic silence.
That is why Sa’ar’s visit matters. It is not just another photo op. When the Israeli foreign minister stands in Hargeisa, he sends a message: We see you. We will not wait for someone in New York, Addis Ababa, or Geneva to give us permission to recognize reality.
Israel, a small country endlessly lectured by international bodies, stepped into a place where great powers and even Africa’s own institutions fear to tread. It did so not to exploit but to partner with a government that has chosen law over warlords and reconciliation over revenge. That is moral diplomacy. But this kind of diplomacy cannot succeed without the voices and faces of East African Jews.
It is difficult – really, impossible – to build a deep, credible relationship with Somaliland and the broader Horn of Africa while Ethiopian and other African – origin Jews remain an afterthought in our own diplomatic system. You cannot go to Hargeisa and present yourself as a partner to African self-determination while your foreign-policy establishment remains overwhelmingly white and Ashkenazi in its visible leadership.
You cannot speak authentically to Somali, Amhara, Tigrayan, Eritrean, or Djiboutian leaders without giving real authority to those Israelis who speak their languages, share their cultural codes, and carry their histories in their bones. Israel cannot afford to imitate the UN and AU. If we are serious about this new chapter with Somaliland – about innovation in the Horn of Africa, about challenging Iran’s influence, about stabilizing one of the world’s most fragile regions – we must put Ethiopian Israelis and other East African Jews at the center of this effort.
Ambassadors and senior envoys
That means appointing them as ambassadors and senior envoys, not just junior staff. It means letting African-origin Jews be Israel’s voice in Africa, not only Africa’s voice inside Israel. When an Ethiopian-Israeli diplomat stands beside the foreign minister in Hargeisa or Addis Ababa or Nairobi, the lies about “white Zionist imperialism” begin to collapse on their own. The accusation cannot survive the sight of Black Jewish diplomats defending Israel’s interests and African dignity at the same time.
To the UN and AU, and to those who hide behind their procedures, I will speak indirectly but plainly: Your moral authority in the Horn of Africa is running on empty. You rewarded those who destroyed and ignored those who built. You used the language of human rights to disguise political cowardice. History will not be kind.
As a Black African Jew and an Israeli, I am proud that my country has finally chosen to see Somaliland and to engage with it. I will be even prouder when our diplomacy there speaks not only with an Israeli accent, but also with an Ethiopian one – when the people of Somaliland see in us not as a distant Western power but as a partner that understands their struggle from the inside.
That is what real moral diplomacy looks like: a relationship of people to people, rooted in mutual dignity and shared responsibility. And that is something no UN or AU resolution can manufacture.
The author is a former NYC Supreme Court Detective, and an investigator and educator in conflict resolution, restorative peace, and moral diplomacy expert. His upcoming book, Moral Diplomacy for a Broken World, is inspired by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks.