On Sunday, October 4, millions of Brazilians will decide Brazil’s political, economic, and social direction. They will also pit against each other two opposing visions of foreign policy and the country’s very place in the world.

On one side, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva represents a sovereign diplomacy committed to multilateralism, international law and the self-determination of peoples. On the other, Flávio Bolsonaro presents himself as the heir to his father’s subservience to the United States and the supremacist regime of “Israel”.

On one side, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva represents a sovereign diplomacy committed to multilateralism, international law and the self-determination of peoples. On the other, Flávio Bolsonaro presents himself as the heir to his father’s subservience to the United States and the supremacist regime of “Israel”.

Palestine is one of the clearest expressions of this divide. These are irreconcilable projects: sovereignty or submission, solidarity or complicity with oppression and genocide.

Lula’s commitment to Palestine did not arise from the present circumstances.

As I demonstrate in my book Palestine: From the Myth of the Promised Land to the Land of Resistance, during his first terms in office Lula developed a genuine presidential diplomacy in defence of Palestinian self-determination, an Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories and the establishment of a sovereign state within the pre-1967 borders.

In December 2003, during a visit to Syria, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Libya, Lula placed Palestine at the heart of his public statements.

The following year, at the UN General Assembly, he warned that the Palestinian people remained far from achieving the self-determination to which they were........

© Middle East Monitor