The Federal Senate of Brazil last week passed a law that inaugurated an official day of friendship with Israel, in a rebuke of the government’s hostility toward the Jewish state under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
The Brazilian Senate, where right and centrist opposition parties have a majority over Lula’s socialist Workers’ Party, in May passed the law promulgating April 12 as “Brazil–Israel Friendship Day.”
But the law only became official on June 25, after the expiration of the period allowing a veto by Lula. He has repeatedly accused Israel of committing genocide.
Allowing the bill to pass may have been a relatively easy concession for Lula’s party, which needs to curry favor with the opposition to get legislation passed on matters that are of more consequence to the Brazilian voter.
Davi Alcolumbre, the president of the Federal Senate of Brazil and the author of the legislation, noted that the law was a revival of an earlier attempt to pass it under former president Dilma Rousseff of Lula’s party, who vetoed it in 2013. The new law comprises a single sentence that merely asserts that Brazil-Israel Friendship Day occurs on April 12.
The date was selected because on that day in 1951, Brazil opened its embassy in Israel.
Beyond celebrating Brazilian-Israeli ties, “The new law goes beyond diplomacy; it recognizes and values the historical, cultural and social contribution of the Jewish community in Brazil, a vibrant, plural community deeply rooted in our national fabric,” added Alcolumbre, who is Jewish.
Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, criticized the government while speaking in the Senate about the law on Friday.
“Now President Lula has missed a great opportunity to show that he was thinking about returning to the right side, defending the right of the State of Israel to exist, defending human rights for Jews,” said Bolsonaro, criticizing Lula’s silence on the law, which some of his party members supported.
“But no, he prefers hatred, he prefers the ideological cause that he puts above all else, including human rights, when he sides with terrorists,” added Bolsonaro.
CONIB, Brazil’s umbrella group of Jewish communities and organizations, welcomed the law as a representation of public sentiment. “The president of the Senate reaffirms the feelings of the Brazilian people, who have love, respect and gratitude for Israel,” according to a statement from CONIB.
“The technology of the Jewish state has greatly benefited the Brazilian state, and Israel is also grateful to Brazil, because, in the figure of Oswaldo Aranha, it recognizes the importance of our country in the creation of the Jewish state,” it added.
Aranha served as president of the U.N. General Assembly in 1947 during the vote on the partition plan for British Mandatory Palestine, which paved the way for international recognition of the State of Israel.
