President Lula da Silva of Brazil has been declared “persona non grata” in Israel in response to his statement on Sunday during a gathering of the African Union accusing Israel of behaving like “Hitler” in its military operations in Gaza.
In response to da Silva’s remarks, Foreign Minister Israel Katz summoned Brazil’s Ambassador to Israel, Federico Mayer, for a reprimand conversation on Monday, which he held at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Center in Jerusalem.
זימנתי הבוקר את שגריר ברזיל בישראל ליד ושם, המקום שמעיד יותר מכל על מה שעשו הנאצים והיטלר ליהודים, בהם בני משפחתי.
ההשוואה של נשיא ברזיל לולה @LulaOficial בין המלחמה הצודקת של ישראל בחמאס, לבין מעשיהם של היטלר והנאצים, שהשמידו 6 מיליון יהודים, היא התקפה אנטישמית חמורה שמחללת את… pic.twitter.com/QErDw4tElb
— ישראל כ”ץ Israel Katz (@Israel_katz) February 19, 2024
During the meeting, Katz showed Mayer the list of names of Jews murdered in the Holocaust, including members of his own family, one of whom was his grandfather, Ephraim Katz.
“This morning I summoned the Brazilian ambassador to Israel near Vashem, the place that testifies more than anything else to what the Nazis and Hitler did to the Jews, including members of my family,” Katz told reporters.
“Brazilian President Lula’s comparison between Israel’s just war against Hamas and the actions of Hitler and the Nazis, who exterminated six million Jews, is a serious antisemitic attack that desecrates the memory of those who perished in the Holocaust,” Katz said.
“We will not forgive and we will not forget.
“In my name and in the name of the citizens of Israel, I informed President Lula that he is an unwelcome person (persona non grata) in Israel until he apologizes and retracts his words,” Katz added.
“What’s happening in Gaza with Palestinians hasn’t happened at any other moment in history. Actually it has: when Hitler decided to kill the Jews,” the far-left 78-year-old president of Brazil told reporters in Addis Ababa.
Despicable and antisemitic demonization of Israel and Jews
Brazil’s Lula says that what Israel is doing to the people in the Gaza Strip “has never happened before in history, apart from what Hitler did to the Jews.”
— Adam Milstein (@AdamMilstein) February 18, 2024
Following the meeting between Mayer and Katz, Brazil’s president recalled the ambassador, ordering him to leave Israel and return to Brasilia.
The Israel Defense Forces have bent over backwards to avoid inflicting harm on Gaza civilians during its war against the enclave’s Iranian-backed Hamas terrorist organization, dropping tens of thousands of leaflets and flyers, sending millions of text messages and making hundreds of thousands of robocalls to Gaza civilians, warning them of plans for combat in their areas and directing them to safe zones and humanitarian corridors to avoid the fighting.
