BOGOTA: Colombian President Gustavo Petro said on Wednesday his country will sever diplomatic ties with Israel, whose leader he described as “genocidal” over its aggression in Gaza.

“Tomorrow (Thursday) diplomatic relations with the state of Israel will be severed… for having a genocidal president,” Petro told a May Day rally in Bogota, referring to Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Petro has taken a critical stance on the Gaza assault. In October, just days after the start of the crisis, Israel said it was “halting security exports” to Colombia after Petro accused Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant of using language about the people of Gaza similar to what the “Nazis said of the Jews.” Israel, one of the main providers of arms to Colombia’s military, then said it was “halting security exports” to the South American country as the diplomatic feud escalated.

Bogota subsequently demanded Israel’s envoy leave the South American country.

‘Recalls the Holocaust’

Petro, Colombia’s first leftist president, has also asserted that “democratic peoples cannot allow Nazism to reestablish itself in international politics.” In February, he suspended Israeli weapons purchases after dozens of people died in a scramble for food aid in the war-torn Palestinian territory — an event he said was “called genocide and recalls the Holocaust.”

Colombia’s armed forces, engaged in a decades-long conflict with leftist guerrillas, rightwing paramilitaries and drug cartels, use Israeli-made weapons and aircraft.

The country has a history of strong diplomatic and military relations with Israel and the United States.

Petro had previously come out in support of Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who also invoked the ire of Israel for saying its Gaza campaign “isn’t a war, it’s a genocide.” Colombia and Brazil supported South Africa’s complaint against Israel to the International Court of Justice in The Hague, alleging the Gaza assault amounted to a breach of the Genocide Convention.

Published in Dawn, May 2nd, 2024