Sunday, January 17, 2016

Brazilian Homosexualist Politician Jean Wyllys Is Criticized for Israel Trip


Brazilian Homosexualist Politician Jean Wyllys Is Criticized for Israel Trip

By Julio Severo
A popular left-wing Brazilian congressman known for his leadership in homosexual political issues is facing a major backlash from the Brazilian and international Left because of his recent trip to Israel. The legislator, Jean Wyllys, has angered the Left after participating in a conference at an Israeli university.
Jean Wyllys at Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Much of the material in this article was drawn from a report in The Intercept, a U.S. liberal publication. The Intercept put Wyllys in its headlines, praising his background of homosexual activism, but criticizing him for a minimal support of Israel.
According to The Intercept, on January 5, Wyllys shocked and infuriated many socialists. He posted a smiling photo of himself to his 871,626 Facebook followers, posing in front of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The attached comment read: “I am very happy and thrilled for the opportunity to visit, for the first time, this city full of history… Tomorrow I will give a lecture at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem… about anti-Semitism, racism, homophobia and other forms of hate and prejudice and the relation to contemporary politics.” The photo garnered more than 24,000 likes and 1,700 comments.
The post immediately unleashed a flurry of comments, some in support but many voicing vehement opposition. Numerous critics specifically expressed shock and outrage that a standard-bearer of Brazil’s progressive movement would so completely break with his party’s official position in support of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.
On Facebook, Wyllys declared that he opposes BDS. “I am against boycotts against any people. I think it is mistaken to confuse the government, the state and the population. Boycott destroys bridges and favors the extremists on both sides,” he wrote, citing the failed U.S. blockade of Cuba as an example.
His comments are befuddling socialists. According to The Intercept, “Brazil has no substantial pro-Israel lobby and support for Palestinian rights is a mainstream position.”
The intercept made a mistake, because the evangelical population in Brazil, formed by more than 46 million Pentecostals and charismatics (according to The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements), is largely supportive of Israel. But these loyal supporters have been befuddled that Israel has officially invited a prominent Brazilian homosexual activist. Why not invite Pentecostal minister Silas Malafaia or other prominent Brazilian evangelical leaders?
Socialists around the world hate Israel. Why does Israel love them?
Conservative evangelicals love Israel. Why does Israel hate their conservative stances against abortion and homosexuality?
The socialist hatred for Israel makes no ideological sense, because Israel is the only nation in the Middle East having legal abortion, gender ideology, homosexual parades, feminism and many other Western evils. Above all, modern Israel was founded by Marxist Jews. The only explanation for this hatred is spiritual: God gave the Jews the land of Israel and everybody know it, because it is in the Bible, the book most read in the world and most hated by the Left.
In addition, there is no logical reason for evangelicals to be so supportive of Israel, which fervently defends the same leftist insanities Jean Wyllys does. But their reason is spiritual. They support Israel even when Israel supports socialists like Wyllys who are stridently opposed to evangelicals and their values. They support Israel because they know that God has a plan for Israel, regardless the fact Israel supports ideologies opposed to evangelicals. It is an insane complexity where Israel, even under a right-wing government, prefers to invite a Wyllys than a Silas Malafaia, who is a prominent evangelical minister in Brazil.
Even so, the Brazilian Left hated Wyllys’ visit to Israel.
Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro, a Brazilian diplomat who served on the Brazil’s Truth Commission (which treated communists as heroes and victims, but their opponents as criminals during the era of Brazil’s military rule) and was a U.N.’s Special Rapporteur on Human Rights, harshly criticized the congressman. “Lamentable and deplorable, Congressman Jean Wyllys’ comments about his visit to Israel reveal a crass ignorance of and total misinformation about Israel’s current human rights policies,” he said. That sentiment is reflective of the left-wing backlash triggered by his trip and subsequent remarks.
Wyllys’ controversial visit to Israel and his defense of Israel come at a particularly tense moment in bilateral relations. Brazil’s leftist Worker’s Party (PT) government, led by embattled President Dilma Rousseff, has refused to accept the appointment of Dani Dayan as Israel’s ambassador to Brazil on the grounds that he is a proponent of Israel’s settlements in the West Bank — which biblically belongs to Israel, but international socialists say that Israel has occupied illegally their own land. Under both Rousseff and her predecessor, PT’s Lula da Silva, their party has been vocally supportive of the Palestinian cause.
Wyllys has built intense popularity among Brazilian socialists with uncompromising defenses of liberal issues: introducing bills promoting marijuana legalization, sexual orientation statutes, full legalization of sex work (prostitution), and rolling back the institutional vestiges of Brazil’s former military rule — all anathema to the growing evangelical Right. He is the only openly gay politician on the national stage of overwhelmingly Catholic Brazil.
What caused more outrage among socialists was that Wyllys appeared at a university that, for them, is a symbol of Israeli “occupation.” Much of Hebrew University of Jerusalem is built in East Jerusalem. For socialists, East Jerusalem is a Palestinian land that was illegally expropriated by Israel. A letter signed by 351 international academics has condemned this university.
The conference attended by Wyllys was titled “Brazil and Israel: Social and Cultural Challenges.” It took place January 5 and 6 and was sponsored by Hebrew University, Brown University, the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Israeli Confederation of Brazil, among other institutions.
In an interaction that appears to have since been deleted, when one Facebook follower asked, “Jean, when will you visit the Gaza Strip?” Wyllys’ account (signed by his communications team) responded, “Maybe you don’t know that the Gaza Strip is currently under the control of the terrorist organization Hamas. It is not, therefore, a safe space for an open homosexual… but maybe you can go. Good luck!” In a later comment, he said he “would also like to go to other Middle Eastern countries, but I cannot, because in many of them I could be hanged or imprisoned for being gay.”
Socialists hate Israel because of the biblical view that the land of Israel was given to the Jews by God, but they love all the leftist pro-abortion and pro-homosexualism laws in Israel.
Evangelicals love Israel because of the biblical view that the land of Israel was given to the Jews by God, but they hate all the leftist pro-abortion and pro-homosexualism laws in Israel.
Socialists love Israeli socialism. But they hate the God factor in Israel and its land. For socialists, this factor annuls all socialist ideologies espoused by the Israeli society. I hope that someday the Jews may see the importance of this factor and how conservative evangelicals, not socialists, are the real friends of Israel.
Jean Wyllys can be criticized for many stances, including his defense of drugs, prostitution and homosexual depravity. But he cannot be criticized for supporting Israel, which is the only nation in the Middle East that does not murder homosexuals.
If socialists think otherwise, they should send all Brazilian and U.S. homosexuals to try to live among Palestinians…
With information from The Intercept.
Portuguese version of this article: Jean Wyllys é criticado por viagem a Israel
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