BOGOTA, Colombia, 17 Oct: (AP) \u2014 Israel has suspended security exports to Colombia in an escalating diplomatic spat over online messages by Colombia\u2019s president comparing Israel\u2019s siege of Gaza to the actions of Nazi Germany.<\/p>\n
Colombian President Gustavo Petro has doubled down on his criticism of Israel and suggested that his country may need to suspend diplomatic relations with Israel, while his foreign minister has suggested Israel\u2019s ambassador should leave the country.<\/p>\n
In a statement published Sunday, Israel\u2019s foreign ministry said that Petro\u2019s recent statements on X, previously known as Twitter, \u201cinflame antisemitism\u201d and \u201cthreaten the safety of the Jewish community in Colombia.\u201d The Israeli government said it called Colombia\u2019s ambassador to a meeting in which she was informed that defense cooperation between the countries would be suspended.<\/p>\n
Colombia currently has diplomatic relations with both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, and over the past two decades it has been one of Israel\u2019s closes partners in Latin America.<\/p>\n
The South American nation uses Israeli-built war planes and machine guns to fight drug cartels and rebel groups and both countries also signed a free trade agreement in 2020.<\/p>\n
But the two nations have been less aligned since Petro took office last year as Colombia\u2019s first leftist president.<\/p>\n
The war of words between Petro and Israel\u2019s Ambassador Gali Dagan started a week ago when Petro refused to condemn the Hamas raid on Israel, in which militants killed hundreds of civilians in their homes.<\/p>\n
When Dagan urged Petro to speak about the \u201cterrorist\u201d attack, Colombia\u2019s president replied with a message that \u201cterrorism is killing innocent children in Palestine\u201d and followed up with messages in which he accused Israel of turning Gaza into a \u201cconcentration camp.\u201d<\/p>\n
The comments comparing Israel\u2019s military to the Nazis sparked criticism from Colombia\u2019s Jewish community and also triggered a response from the U.S. State Department, which said last Thursday through its Special Envoy to Combat and Monitor Antisemitism that it was \u201cshocked\u201d to see Colombia\u2019s president comparing \u201cthe Israeli government to Hitler\u2019s genocidal regime.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over the weekend Petro wrote on X that Hamas had been \u201cinvented\u201d by Israel\u2019s intelligence services in order to divide Palestinians and \u201chave an excuse\u201d to \u201cpunish\u201d them. He provided no proof to back his claims.<\/p>\n
Dagan mocked Petro\u2019s message with a sarcastic reply in which he wrote that his nation\u2019s intelligence services had also \u201ccreated\u201d Colombia\u2019s largest paramilitary group and that \u201cJews with big noses\u201d still rule over the group.<\/p>\n
On Monday, Colombian Foreign Minister Alvaro Leyva wrote on his X account that Dagan should \u201cleave\u201d the country and apologize for his messages. Later however he wrote that Israel\u2019s ambassador had not been expelled and that relations between both countries would be maintained if Israel so desired. \u201cRespectful relations between states are always welcome\u201d Leyva wrote.<\/p>\n
Petro doubled down on his critiques of Israel over the weekend, describing its military campaign in Gaza as \u201cgenocide\u201d and threatening to break off relations with the Jewish state.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we must suspend diplomatic relations with Israel, then that is what we will do\u201d he wrote on X on Sunday. \u201cYou cannot insult the president of Colombia.\u201d<\/p>\n
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BOGOTA, Colombia, 17 Oct: (AP) \u2014 Israel has suspended security exports to Colombia in an escalating diplomatic spat over online messages by Colombia\u2019s president comparing Israel\u2019s siege of Gaza to the actions of Nazi Germany. Colombian President Gustavo Petro has doubled down on his criticism of Israel and suggested that his country may need to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-226508","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=226508"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226508\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}