Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu criticized President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's comments in which he compared Israel's actions in the conflict with the terrorist group Hamas to Nazism. He said Lula's speech was shameful and serious and said that Foreign Minister Israel Katz would invite Brazilian Ambassador to Israel Frederico Meyer for a “tough censure talk.”
“It's about trivializing the Holocaust and trying to harm the Jewish people and Israel's right to defend itself. Comparing Israel to the Nazi Holocaust and Hitler crosses a red line. “Israel is fighting to defend itself and secure its future until complete victory and will continue to do so while defending international law,” Netanyahu said on social media.
הדברים של נשיא ברזיל מבישים וחמורים. מדובר בזילות השואה ובניסיון לפגוע בעם היהודי ובזכותה של ישראל להגן עצמה.
ההשוואה בין ישראל לשואת הנאצים ולהיטלר היא חציית קו אדום. ישראל נלחמת למען הגנתה והבטחת עתידה עד לניצחון המוחלט והיא עושה זאת תוך שמירה על הדין הבינלאומי.
Never…
— Benjamin Netanyahu בנימין נתניהו (@netanyahu) February 18, 2024
Lula's statement was made at a press conference this Sunday (18), after the President's participation in the 37th Summit of Heads of State and Government of the African Union in Addis Adeba, capital of Ethiopia. “What is happening to the Palestinian people in Gaza has never happened at any other time in history. In fact, it existed when Hitler decided to kill the Jews,” he said.
“Perverse distortion of reality”
Conib (Israeli Confederation of Brazil) rejected the president's statements and classified the Brazilian leader's speech as a “perverse distortion of reality that hurts the memory of the victims of the Holocaust and their descendants.”
“The Nazis exterminated 6 million defenseless Jews in Europe simply because they were Jews. Israel is now defending itself against a terrorist group that invaded the country, killed more than a thousand people, promoted mass rape, burned people alive and defended it in his letter. “The basis for the elimination of the Jewish state,” says Conib.
The company also criticized the Brazilian government's stance regarding the conflict. “An extreme and unbalanced attitude towards the tragic conflict in the Middle East, abandoning the tradition of balance and the search for dialogue in Brazilian foreign policy,” the text says.
Criticism of donations to an organization suspected of helping Hamas
During his trip to the African continent, Lula also announced that Brazil would send resources to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). The Brazilian government's funding of the organization comes at a time when other countries decided to cut funding allocated to UNRWA's activities after the organization was accused by Israel of collaborating with the terrorist group Hamas.
Lula's announcement sparked a reaction from authorities, politicians and experts. MP Kim Kataguiri (UniãoSP) asked the court to suspend transfers from Brazil to the agency. On a social network, Kataguiri explained that the Federal Constitution prescribes, among other things, legality and morality as guiding principles of public administration. “The transfer of Brazilian public funds to an entity accused of direct involvement in terrorist attacks, as in the case of UNRWA, directly contradicts these principles,” he claimed. The Novo party also filed a criminal complaint against the president with the PGR (General Prosecutor's Office).
The President of the Israeli Federation of Brazil, Marcos Knobel, also criticized Lula's position. “The president will increase payments to a UN agency accused of supporting a terrorist group if Western and democratic countries stop their payments. Brazil goes against the grain with dictatorships. The behavior of Brazilian diplomacy on the issue of this conflict is deplorable,” he explained.