Brazil’s Lula compares Israel’s war on Gaza with the Holocaust
Israeli foreign minister says he will summon Brazil’s
ambassador for a reprimand over the remarks which Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu described as ‘disgraceful’.
18 Feb 2024
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has
accused Israel of committing “genocide” against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip
and compared its war on Gaza with Adolf Hitler’s campaign to exterminate Jewish
people.
“What’s happening in the Gaza Strip isn’t a war, it’s
a genocide,” Lula told reporters in Addis Ababa where he was attending an
African Union summit on Sunday.
“It’s not a war of soldiers against soldiers. It’s a
war between a highly prepared army and women and children,” added the Brazilian
president.
“What’s happening in the Gaza Strip with the
Palestinian people hasn’t happened at any other moment in history. Actually, it
has happened: when Hitler decided to kill the Jews.”
Led by Hitler, the Nazis systematically killed six
million Jews during World War II.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said he would
summon Brazil’s ambassador for a reprimand over the remarks.
“No one will compromise Israel’s right to defend
itself,” Katz said on X, adding that the envoy would be summoned on Monday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described
the comments as “disgraceful and grave”.
“This is a trivialisation of the Holocaust and an
attempt to attack the Jewish people and the right of Israel to self-defence.
Drawing comparisons between Israel and the Nazis and Hitler is to cross a red
line,” Netanyahu said in a statement.
Lula, 78, had condemned the Hamas-led October 7 attack
on southern Israel as a “terrorist” act the day it happened.
But he has since grown vocally critical of Israel’s
retaliatory military campaign in Gaza.
At least 1,139 people were killed in the Hamas-led
attack on southern Israel, mostly civilians, according to an Al Jazeera tally
of Israeli official figures.
Hamas members also took about 250 people captive, 130
of whom are still in Gaza, including 30 who are presumed dead, according to
Israeli authorities.
Israel’s retaliatory assault on Gaza has killed at
least 28,858 people, mostly women and children, according to Palestinian
authorities.
Lula criticised Western countries’ recent decisions to
halt aid to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, after Israel accused
some of its employees of involvement in the Hamas-led attack.
Lula, who met with Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad
Shtayyeh Saturday on the sidelines of the summit, has said Brazil will increase
its own contribution to the agency and urged other countries to do the same.
“When I see the rich world announce that it’s halting
its contributions to humanitarian aid for the Palestinians, I just imagine how
big these people’s political awareness is and how big the spirit of solidarity
in their hearts is,” Lula said.
“We need to stop being small when we need to be big.”
He reiterated his call for a two-state solution to the
conflict, with Palestine “definitively recognised as a full and sovereign
state”.
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