Authoritarians get warm embrace from Netanyahu
JERUSALEM — The first visit of a leader of the Philippines is sure to be touted by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as another success in his campaign to enhance Israel’s relations across the globe. But critics say this outreach has come at a cost, with Netanyahu cozying up to authoritarian leaders, some of whom are guilty of human rights abuses.
Netanyahu takes great pride that under his leadership Israel has found new friends in Europe, as well as in far-flung countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America that long sided with the Palestinians at the United Nations and other global bodies.
But while many of Netanyahu’s new allies have offered blanket support for Israel, or at least indifference to its conflict with the Palestinians, some have also voiced borderline antiSemitic sentiments and adopted a revisionist approach to the most painful chapters of Jewish history.
The Philippines’ foulmouthed president, Rodrigo Duterte, who has cursed out everyone from Barack Obama to God, will receive a warm welcome in the Holy Land. He arrived in Israel on Sunday for a four-day visit, the first presidential visit since the countries established diplomatic relations in 1957. He is expected to lunch with Netanyahu, meet other top officials and visit the country’s Holocaust memorial. He is also expected to sign a major oil deal and view an arms display.
His forces are accused of killing thousands in antidrug raids since he took office in 2016. Duterte drew outrage that year when he compared his antidrug campaign to the Holocaust, and himself to Hitler, saying he would be “happy to slaughter” 3 million addicts. He later apologized.
Netanyahu also welcomed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban for a visit in July as a “true friend of Israel.”
Orban drew criticism last year for praising Miklos Horthy, Hungary’s World War II-era ruler, who introduced anti-Semitic laws and collaborated with the Nazis.
Critics also have accused Orban of employing anti-Semitic tropes against the Jewish Hungarian-American billionaire philanthropist George Soros. In denouncing Soros, Orban said Hungary’s enemies “do not believe in work, but speculate with money; they have no homeland, but feel that the whole world is theirs.”
Despite global Jewish condemnation of the remarks, Netanyahu praised Orban for combatting anti-Semitism and thanked him for Hungary’s pro-Israel stance.
Orban, who has exhibited increasing authoritarianism at home, has cast himself as the champion of a Christian Europe and adopted an aggressive stance to halt the flow of African and Muslim migrants through Hungary.
Netanyahu also has vouched for President Trump when the president’s critics have accused him of failing to counter the anti-Semitic rhetoric of some of his supporters and of downplaying the rise of white nationalists, including those who marched in Charlottesville, Va., last year under the slogan “Jews will not replace us.”