Brazil’s new President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva gestures as he is sworn in at the National Congress, in Brasilia, Brazil, January 1, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Jacqueline Lisboa
Israeli leaders blasted Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva for his comparison of Israel’s war against the Hamas terrorist group in Gaza to the Holocaust.
“By comparing Israel’s war in Gaza against Hamas, a genocidal terrorist organization, to the Holocaust, President da Silva has disgraced the memory of the 6 million Jews murdered by the Nazis and demonized the Jewish state like the most virulent anti-Semite,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement Monday. “He should be ashamed of himself.”
Additionally, Brazil’s ambassador to Israel was called for a reprimand by Foreign Minister Israel at Yad Vashem, Israel’s national Holocaust memorial and museum.
Speaking to the press before the meeting, Katz said “I brought you to a place that testifies more than anything the Nazis did who murdered 6 million of our Jewish people. The comparison of the President of Brazil between Israel’s just war against Hamas and the Nazis’ and Hitler’s act of extermination against the Jews is a disgrace and a serious antisemitic attack. I would like to convey to the president that we will not forgive him and he is an unwanted personality in Israel as long as he does not retract and apologize.”
The moves come after the Brazilian leftist leader told the African Union summit “What’s happening in the Gaza Strip isn’t a war, it’s a genocide. It’s not a war of soldiers against soldiers. It’s a war between a highly prepared army and women and children.” Continuing, he said “What is happening in the Gaza Strip with the Palestinian people hasn’t happened at any other moment in history, except one: When Hitler decided to kill the Jews.”
The Brazilian Israelite Confederation spoke out against da Silva’s statement, saying they “offend the memory of Holocaust victims and their descendants” and are a “perverse distortion of reality.”
Brazil’s leader joins South Africa’s government in calling Israel’s defensive war “genocide.” The latter filed charges against Israel accusing it of the crime, of which the International Court of Justice in The Hague is currently debating.
On October 7 more than 1,200 Israelis were killed and over 240 taken hostage by Hamas. The Hamas run Gaza Health Ministry has said since the attack, nearly 30,000 Gazans have been killed. This number does not take into consideration terrorists killed or Palestinians killed by errant Hamas rocket fire.
The IDF is reportedly operating at a “1:1 civilians to combatant” death ratio, according to a statement from Prime Minister Netanyahu. Netanyahu lamented the civilian casualties but pointed out that such a ratio is unheard of in modern warfare, pointing to the nearly 4:1 ratio during the US and its allies bombings of Mosul against ISIS.
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