Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva recalled his ambassador to Israel for “consultations” hours after he was publicly reprimanded by Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz at Yad Vashem.

Additionally, Israeli Ambassador Daniel Zonshine was summoned for a reprimand in Rio de Janeiro.

According to CNN Brasil, Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira spoke firmly but politely in the 30-minute meeting, saying that the public reprimand was a “spectacle” and beyond normal diplomatic practice and also expressed dissatisfaction with the fact that Katz spoke to the press in Hebrew without providing an interpreter in Portuguese, forcing Ambassador Federico Mayer to stand there without knowing what was being said.

At Yad Vashem, Katz said that Lula was a persona non grata in Israel until he retracted his statements and apologized. However, Lula reportedly has no intention of retracting his statements.

Late Tuesday afternoon, Katz wrote a harshly worded message to Lula on Twitter in Portuguese, saying: “Millions of Jews around the world are waiting for your apology. How dare you compare Israel to Hitler? Is it necessary to remind you what Hitler did? He took millions of people to ghettos, stole their property, used them as forced laborers and then, with endless brutality, began to systematically murder them. First with gunshots, then with gas – an industry for exterminating Jews in an orderly and cruel way.”

“Israel embarked on a defensive war against the new Nazis who murdered any Jew they saw. It didn’t matter to them whether they were elderly, babies, or disabled. They murdered a girl in a wheelchair. They kidnapped babies. If we didn’t have an army, they would have murdered tens of thousands more. How embarrassing. Your comparison is outrageous, delusional.  A shame on Brazil and a spit in the face of Brazilian Jews.”

“It’s not too late to learn history and apologize. Until then – you will remain persona non grata in Israel!”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)