Colombia vows to sever ties with Israel if UN truce resolution is breached

Colombian President Gustavo Petro has vowed to break off diplomatic ties with Israel if the country doesn't comply with a UN Security Council resolution that calls for an immediate ceasefire in besieged Gaza.

"If Israel does not comply with the United Nations ceasefire resolution, we will break diplomatic relations with Israel," Petro said on X, formerly Twitter, on Tuesday.

On Monday, he published another message in which he celebrated the resolution's approval and urged other nations to suspend ties with Israel if it doesn't cease its brutal war in Gaza.

Israel's Foreign Minister, Israel Katz, replied to Petro's warning on Tuesday with a tweet, which said that the Middle Eastern nation will "continue to protect its people and will not give in to any pressures and threats."

He accused Petro of being a "supporter of Hamas terrorists" and said that Petro's stance is a "disgrace to the Colombian people."

The confrontation on X signals a growing deterioration in the relations between both nations, which have gone from being military and commercial partners to becoming bitter ideological rivals.

For decades, Colombia used Israeli-built warplanes and machine guns to fight drug cartels and rebel groups, and both countries signed a free trade agreement in 2020.

However, relations began to cool in 2022, when Petro was elected to office.

Stained relations

Petro, a longtime supporter of the Palestinian cause, has described Israel's war in Gaza as "genocide."

In February, he suspended military purchases from Israel after the country's troops fired on Palestinians who gathered around aid trucks in a crime where Israel killed over 100 people.

Israel's Foreign Ministry had suspended defence cooperation with Colombia in October after Petro had refused to condemn the Hamas.

Israel has killed more than 32,333 Palestinians and wounded over 74,694 others in the blockaded enclave.

The Israeli war, now in its day 173, has pushed 85 percent of Gaza's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60 percent of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). An interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.