After drawing international condemnation for posting “Heil Hitler” on social media, Colombian President Gustavo Petro again invoked Nazi comparisons during a United Nations Security Council meeting on Wednesday, stating that “we’re going back to the era of the Nazis.”
Speaking during a debate on global conflicts and migration, Petro argued that economic interests, particularly what he described as “the fight for oil,” are what “makes missiles rain down on people, on babies.”
“20,000 people have been killed in Gaza. Those numbers cannot be hidden,” he said.
“That is the real red thread of what I’m going to say here,” he added. “We’re going back to the era of the Nazis.”
Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, swiftly decried the remarks, accusing Petro of distorting Holocaust history and using Nazi comparisons for political purposes.
“The United Nations Security Council was not created to serve as a stage for bizarre ideological rants and the dangerous distortion of Holocaust history,” Danon said. “Giving legitimacy to rhetoric that recklessly manipulates the memory of Nazism dishonors the victims of the Holocaust and undermines the credibility of this institution.”
Danon said Petro should be “ashamed” of his comments.
“There is a profound moral difference between serious diplomatic debate and the casual, repeated abuse of Nazi comparisons for political provocation,” he said. “When world leaders invoke Hitler and Goebbels to attack political opponents or democratic states, they erode the historical truth of the Holocaust and fuel dangerous antisemitic discourse.”
The exchange came days after Petro sparked outrage by posting “Heil Hitler” on June 7 in response to an opinion column supporting right-wing presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella, the leading candidate, ahead of Colombia’s June 21 presidential runoff election. The article also condemned Iván Cepeda, the candidate of the left-wing coalition backed by Petro. “Whatever is going on in your personal life, there are lines that must never be crossed,” Danon wrote in response to Petro’s post. “Using Nazi slogans is a low that there’s no coming back from.”
