Zionism has prevented peace in the Levant through its control of international finance, according to Colombian President Gustavo Petro.
“Zionism, strongly supported by international financial capital that it partially controls, prevents peace and unleashes horror on Palestine, leading its most radical factions into the trap set by terrorism,” he said Monday in response to criticism of his positions on the Israel-Hamas War.
In 1948, Palestinians opened their cities and territories to Jews who fled the Nazis with the intention of coexisting, supposedly as they had done with the Jews that had already lived in the Levant,” Petro wrote on X/Twitter.
“Just a few months later, the nationalist influx forged a political current under the newly created State of Israel that led to the violent expulsion of Palestinians from their own homes and villages,” he added. “There was never any justice for the Palestinian people; they were segregated in their own homeland, and factions within them had to resort to armed struggle for national liberation.”
All the progressive peace-oriented actors, including Yasser Arafat, were dead and had been replaced by religious radical leadership in Israel and Gaza, Petro said.
“Peace is a human priority,” he said. “The progressive movements that still exist in the Arab world, Israel, and the United States should seek to meet. Perhaps progressive dialogue in the Middle East could find the paths to peace. Colombia must be ready to help whenever it is asked. Colombia’s path inside and outside the country is peace.”
Classical antisemitism
In response, Marina Rosenberg, a former Israeli ambassador to Chile and Anti-Defamation League international affairs senior vice president, said Petro was resorting to a classical antisemitic trope about Jewish control of international finance.
“Anti-Israel obsession and constant distortion of history fuel hatred and perpetuate dangerous myths,” she said.
Prof. Marcos Peckel, director of the Confederation of Jewish Communities of Colombia, said besides the ahistoricity of Petro’s comments, his decision last May to break diplomatic ties with Israel also cut channels for negotiating peace.
“By breaking diplomatic relations with Israel, in addition to many other disadvantages, Colombia was left without dialogue with one of the parties in the conflict,” Peckel wrote. “This prevents us, as a country, and you, as president, from participating in efforts to achieve peace and reconciliation while also constituting an obstacle to any humanitarian efforts.”
The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Latin American branch said Petro was telling a story of “good Palestinians” and “bad Jews” despite Palestinian leaders refusing proposals for peaceful coexistence since the Jewish state’s inception.