![Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva attends the "Strengthening Multilateralism, Economic and Financial Issues, and Artificial Intelligence" session during the 17th BRICS Leaders Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on July 7, 2025. [Murat Gök - Anadolu Agency]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/AA-20250707-38490996-38490994-TURKISH_FOREIGN_MINISTER_HAKAN_FIDAN_IN_BRAZIL-1-1.jpg?fit=920%2C613&ssl=1)
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has called for an end to the international silence over crimes committed by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip, stressing that “what is happening amounts to genocide against Palestinian civilians”.
Speaking at the opening of the BRICS summit on Sunday in Rio de Janeiro — attended by leaders of 11 emerging economies — da Silva said: “We cannot remain indifferent to the genocide carried out by Israel in Gaza, the indiscriminate killing of innocent civilians and the use of hunger as a weapon of war.”
Da Silva has repeatedly accused Israel of committing genocide in the besieged Gaza Strip. His comparison of the war to the Holocaust triggered a diplomatic crisis.
At a public event in February 2024, he stated: “What Israel is doing is not a war, it is genocide, because it is killing women and children.”
In response, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on 19 February 2024 that the Brazilian president’s remarks amounted to “a disgrace to the memory of the Holocaust and an attempt to harm the Jewish people and Israel’s right to defend itself,” as he put it.
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