Palestinian political forces and civil society have joined in a letter to the newly appointed Brazilian minister of defence Celso Amorim congratulating him for his appointment and expressing their hope that under his mandate Brazil's defense policies would lead to a new area of respect for human and Palestinian rights. This clearly means ending Brazil's military relations with Israel and cutting contracts with Israeli arms companies. Brazil today is the world's 4th largest importer of Israeli arms and keeps many joint ventures.
The letter by Palestinian political forces and civil society comes as part of the campaign for a comprehensive and mandatory military embargo against Israel and a wider campaign taken up by Brazilian civil society to end military relations with Israel. Numerous Brazilian organizations, among them the CUT, the Brazilian trade union confederation with 22 million members and the powerful Landless Movement MST have issued statements in support of the Palestinian call for a military embargo on Israel as well as an end to Brazil's military ties with Israel.
Stop the Wall has detailed the far reaching military ties between Brazil and Israel in a report issued on March 30 and underlined the fact that these ties contradict the expressed support of Brazil for Palestinian rights.