Conservative, pro-Israel candidate Abelardo de la Espriella has won Colombia’s presidential election, defeating far-left candidate Iván Cepeda in a major political shift that ends the presidency of Gustavo Petro, one of Israel’s fiercest critics in Latin America.

A close ally of President Donald Trump, de la Espriella has pledged to restore diplomatic ties with Israel after Petro severed relations in 2024, strengthen security cooperation with Jerusalem, and adopt a hardline anti-crime strategy modeled on El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele.

Petro’s presidency was marked by repeated attacks on Israel, including comparing it to Nazi Germany, accusing it of “genocide,” refusing to condemn Hamas after the October 7 massacre, and posting “Heil Hitler” on social media during the campaign.

Petro and Cepeda have vowed to challenge the election results, with the outgoing president alleging, without evidence, that Israel hacked Colombia’s voting system and interfered in the election. Despite the accusations, no presidential recount has ever overturned a Colombian presidential election. Trump celebrated de la Espriella’s victory with a brief post: “He Won, BIG!”

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Outgoing Colombian President Gustavo Petro sparked a firestorm of criticism after posting the phrase “Heil Hitler” on social media during a heated political dispute ahead of Colombia’s presidential runoff election.

The remark drew swift condemnation from Israel and lawmakers across Latin America. Israel’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon demanded an apology, calling the use of Nazi slogans a disgrace, while Israel’s Foreign Ministry described the post as a “total loss of moral compass.” More than two dozen Latin American legislators also denounced Petro, warning that repeated Nazi comparisons trivialize the Holocaust and fuel antisemitism.

Petro later defended the comment, claiming he was criticizing what he viewed as “fascist” rhetoric from political opponents. However, critics noted that this is far from the first time he has invoked Nazi imagery. Since the October 7 Hamas massacre, Petro has repeatedly compared Israel to Nazi Germany, severed diplomatic ties with the Jewish state, and faced growing accusations of legitimizing anti-Israel and antisemitic rhetoric in Colombia.

The controversy comes just days before Colombia’s presidential runoff, with the country’s relationship with Israel emerging as a major campaign issue and pro-Israel candidates pledging to restore diplomatic ties if elected.

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The column in the Colombian daily El Espectador supported presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella and condemned Iván Cepeda, the candidate of the left-wing coalition backed by Petro.

By Etgar Lefkovits, JNS

Colombia’s outgoing left-wing president, Gustavo Petro, on Sunday posted “Heil Hitler” in response to an op-ed column supporting the right-wing candidate in this month’s presidential runoff vote.

The inflammatory rhetoric was widely condemned ahead of the June 21 election, where the opposition conservative candidate is the front-runner.

“The president of Colombia posted, ‘Heil Hitler.’ In 2026,” the New York-based Anti-Defamation League tweeted on X.

“An elected head of state shouldn’t have to be told why posting a Nazi slogan is monstrous and unacceptable. There is no excuse for it and no context that justifies it.”

Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon wrote, “President of Colombia @petro gustavo, even in the situation you’re in, there are lines that aren’t crossed. Using Nazi slogans is a low that there’s no coming back from.”

He continued: “I hope that you’ll manage to pull yourself together and apologize by next Wednesday, when you’re supposed to lead the discussion in the UN Security Council.”

The Israeli Foreign Ministry tweeted on Monday, “A total loss of moral compass and an indelible stain on Colombia’s legacy.”

The column in the Colombian daily El Espectador supported presidential candidate Abelardo de la Espriella and condemned Iván Cepeda, the candidate of the left-wing coalition backed by Petro.

Petro severed diplomatic ties with Israel in 2024 over the Gaza war triggered by the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack and expelled Israeli diplomats from the South American country.

De la Espriella, a 47-year-old lawyer and political outsider nicknamed “El Tigre,” or “The Tiger,” who topped the first round of voting after securing the backing of conservative and evangelical groups, pledged during the election campaign to open an embassy in Jerusalem and renew a strategic alliance with Israel.

The vote could herald another gain for the right-wing wave sweeping across Latin America, whose leaders share U.S. President Donald Trump’s tough approach in dealing with drug traffickers, and offer a marked shift in foreign alliances.

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Colombians head to the polls on Sunday in a deeply divided presidential election that could determine whether the country restores relations with Israel or continues the anti-Israel policies of President Gustavo Petro.

Left-wing candidate Ivan Cepeda has pledged to maintain Petro’s stance after Colombia severed ties with Israel in 2024. Facing him are several pro-Israel candidates, including Abelardo De La Espriella, who has vowed to reopen a strategic alliance with Israel and establish a Colombian embassy in Jerusalem.

With polls pointing toward a runoff, the election is shaping up as a high-stakes battle over security, the economy, and Colombia’s future relationship with the Jewish state.

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Earlier this year, Petro resisted deportation flights using American military aircraft, leading to a diplomatic crisis as Trump threatened to retaliate with higher tariffs and visa suspensions.

By The Associated Press

Tensions between the United States and Colombia have escalated with the State Department announcing it was revoking a visa for Gustavo Petro, president of the Latin American country, after he participated in a New York protest where he called on American soldiers to disobey President Donald Trump’s orders.

The department said on social media that “we will revoke Petro’s visa due to his reckless and incendiary actions.”

Petro was visiting for the annual U.N. General Assembly. During a nearby protest Friday over the war in Gaza, he said “I ask all the soldiers of the United States’ army, don’t point your rifles against humanity” and “disobey the orders of Trump.”

Petro returned to Colombia on Saturday as intended, in accordance with a Sept. 18 decree on the delegation of powers during his absence. He said on X that he found out about his visa status upon his arrival.

The State Department did not answer questions about whether the revocation would affect future visits.

Petro, Colombia’s first leftist president, used a post on X addressed to Trump to say that “international law grants me immunity to go to the U.N. and that there should be no reprisals for my free opinion, because I am a free person.”

Petro, who has a history of speaking off the cuff in meandering, ideologically charged speeches, also said on social media that “I don’t care” about the punishment because he is also a European citizen.

That means he does not need a visa to travel to the U.S.

Colombia has long been a top U.S. ally in Latin America, cooperating closely on the fight against drug trafficking. But there have been repeated clashes between Petro, a former rebel group member, and Trump’s Republican administration.

In his General Assembly speech Tuesday, Petro called for a criminal investigation of Trump and other officials involved in this month’s deadly strikes on boats in the Caribbean that the White House has said were transporting drugs.

The White House has offered scant information about how the operations came together or the legal authorities under which they were carried out.

Earlier this year, Petro resisted deportation flights using American military aircraft, leading to a diplomatic crisis as Trump threatened to retaliate with higher tariffs and visa suspensions.

The U.S. is Colombia’s largest trading partner, and Petro’s government relented, saying it would accept the planes.

The U.S. accused Colombia earlier this month of failing to cooperate with anti-narcotics efforts.

Although the designation did not include sanctions that would have slashed U.S. assistance to the country, it was a sharp rebuke that frustrated Petro.

He said his country had lost the lives of “policemen, soldiers and regular citizens, trying to stop cocaine” from reaching the United States.

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Within an hour, Gustavo Petro arranged to have his presidential plane pick up the migrants.

By Washington Free Beacon

President Donald Trump announced sweeping punitive measures against Colombia on Sunday after its Marxist president, Gustavo Petro, denied entry to two U.S. military deportation planes filled with migrants.

Trump in turn imposed an “emergency” 25 percent tariff on Colombian goods—and it took Petro less than an hour to offer his presidential plane to pick up the migrants.

Other measures include a travel ban on Colombian government officials and their “allies and supporters,” as well as visa sanctions on “all Party Members, Family Members, and Supporters of the Colombia government” Trump announced in a statement.

“These measures are just the beginning,” Trump said. “We will not allow the Colombia Government to violate its legal obligations with regard to the acceptance and return of the Criminals they forced into the United States!”

Petro made amends to receive the migrants shortly thereafter, announcing in a statement that he would send his presidential plane.

“The Government of Colombia, under the leadership of President Gustavo Petro, has arranged for the presidential plane to facilitate the dignified return of Colombian nationals who were to arrive in the country today in the morning hours, coming from deportation flights,” the statement said.

The ordeal comes as an early diplomatic standoff stemming from the mass deportations Trump campaigned on.

In his first week back in the White House, Trump began military deportation flights to Colombia, Guatemala, and Mexico.

He also sent 1,500 active-duty troops to the southern border, with additional deployments set to follow, and launched illegal immigration raids in major cities across the country.

A majority of U.S. adults, 55 percent, support Trump’s mass deportations, according to a New York Times poll conducted shortly before Trump’s inauguration.

The situation began earlier on Sunday when Petro, a former member of the Marxist M-19 guerilla group, prevented two American military planes from landing in his country.

The planes were carrying around 80 Colombian migrants who were deported under Trump’s tough new border policies.

Mexico similarly blocked a U.S. deportation plane from taking off last week, but the Trump administration resolved the situation, and Mexico accepted four deportation flights on Thursday.

Petro’s decision to block the planes serves as an early test for the Trump administration as it seeks to seal up America’s porous southern border and deport scores of illegals, many of whom are convicted violent criminals.

The fresh sanctions also suggest that Trump, unlike the Biden White House, is ready to confront a host of far-left Latin American governments that have stoked anti-American and anti-Western fervor for years.

In Colombia’s case, Petro has established himself as a fierce opponent of Israel’s government, accusing it of “genocide” and severing diplomatic ties after Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror spree.

While the Colombian deportation flights were initially cleared for landing, Petro revoked their diplomatic clearances at the last moment, according to NBC News.

“The US cannot treat Colombian migrants as criminals,” Petro said in a Spanish-language message on X. I deny the entry of American planes carrying Colombian migrants into our territory. The United States must establish a protocol for the dignified treatment of migrants before we receive them.”

Trump, in turn, took aim at Petro, calling him a “socialist” who “is already very unpopular amongst his people.”

Donald Trump’s statement on Colombian president Gustavo Petro.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that, under Trump, “America will no longer be lied to nor taken advantage of.”

“It is the responsibility of each nation to take back their citizens who are illegally present in the United States in a serious and expeditious manner,” Rubio said in a statement provided to the Washington Free Beacon.

“Colombian President Petro had authorized flights and provided all needed authorizations and then canceled his authorization when the planes were in the air.”

“As demonstrated by today’s actions, we are unwavering in our commitment to end illegal immigration and bolster America’s border security.”

Petro spent his youth as a member of Colombia’s far-left M-19 militant group, which sought to violently topple the government.

In 1985, the group stormed Colombia’s national judicial building, sparking a clash that killed 94 people and that is remembered as “one of the bloodiest acts in the country’s recent history,” according to the New York Times.

Petro was also known as a close adviser to Venezuela’s former anti-American president, Hugo Chavez. As Colombia’s president, Petro modeled himself as a socialist revolutionary, finding common cause with the Hamas terrorist group after its shocking terror attack on Israel.

Some of his comments around the Middle East war drew accusations of anti-Semitism from Jewish advocacy groups.

In September, roughly one year after Hamas’s attack, Petro accused the global media of covering up alleged Israeli crimes, likening them to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels.

“Anyone who defends this genocide or remains silent in the face of it has destroyed their own human condition,” Petro said at the time. “It would seem as if Goebbels is the one who directs the world’s communications so that tens of thousands of journalists are silenced in the face of their murdered colleagues and 20,000 babies torn to pieces by bombs.”

Rep. Brian Mast (R., Fla.) said Trump’s actions to confront Petro show “the rule of law and the law of the jungle have returned.”

“We don’t allow our people to cross Colombia’s borders illegally, they shouldn’t allow theirs to cross ours illegally,” he told the Free Beacon. “If they do, they should work with us to clean up the mess.”

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Israel imports more than 50% of its coal from Colombia and uses much of it to feed its power plants.

By The Associated Press

Colombian President Gustavo Petro announced on Saturday that his country will suspend coal exports to Israel over the war in Gaza, as relations sour between two countries that were once close military and commercial allies.

Petro wrote on the social media platform X that coal exports will only resume “when the genocide” in Gaza stops.

Petro also posted a draft decree, which says that coal exports will only resume if Israel complies with a recent order by the International Court of Justice that says Israel should withdraw its troops from the Gaza strip.

According to Colombia’s National Statistics Department, coal exports to Israel were worth more than $320 million in the first eight months of last year. That’s a small fraction of the nation’s overall coal exports which were worth more than $9 billion in 2023.

Israel imports more than 50% of its coal from Colombia, according to the American Journal for Transportation, and uses much of it to feed its power plants.

Petro, who was elected into office in 2022 as Colombia’s first leftist president, broke diplomatic ties with Israel in May saying that he could not maintain relations with the “genocidal” government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Both governments have continued to keep consulates in each other’s territories and conduct trade.

Colombia has long depended on Israel for military hardware that includes assault rifles and intelligence equipment. The South American nation has also bought more than 30 fighter jets from Israel over the past three decades, and depends on Israeli companies for their maintenance.

New military purchases have been halted, however, as relations between both countries deteriorate. Critics of Petro have said that the president’s decision to cut ties with Israel jeopardizes Colombia’s security capabilities as its military fights drug cartels and rebel groups in rural parts of the country.

But others applauded Petro’s latest move against Israel. The Global Energy Embargo for Palestine, an advocacy group that has been trying to convince nations around the world to stop coal and oil exports to Israel, said in a statement on Saturday that Colombia’s decision could put pressure on Israel to change its policies in the Gaza Strip, and will also put pressure on Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria that rely on electric plants fueled by coal imports.

“We urgently call on South Africa, which provides 9% of Israel’s coal, to follow Colombia’s lead,” the group said in the statement, while urging other countries with significant energy exports to also consider a ban.

Unlike previous Colombian presidents, who kept strong ties with Israel, Petro has been an outspoken critic of the Middle Eastern nation and initially refused to condemn the Hamas attack that preceded Israel’s invasion of Gaza.

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Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz condemned President Gustavo Petro for his actions.

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Colombian President Gustavo Petro vows to cut diplomatic ties with Israel over Gaza war, threatens to turn join South Africa’s petition to the International Court of Justice.

By David Rosenberg, World Israel News

The far-left president of Colombia threatened Wednesday to join South Africa’s petition to the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of genocide in the Gaza Strip, while pledging to end diplomatic ties with the Jewish state.

In an address in the city of Bogota Wednesday, marking International Worker’s Day, President Gustavo Petro, former member of the M-19 terrorist organization, said that his government would end diplomatic relations with Israel Thursday.

“Here in front of you, the government of change, of the president of the republic announces that tomorrow we will break diplomatic relations with the state of Israel…for having a government, for having a president who is genocidal,” Petro said.

Shortly afterwards, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz responded to Petro’s comments on Twitter/X.

“History will remember that Gustavo Petro decided to side with the most despicable monsters known to mankind who burned babies, murdered children, raped women and kidnapped innocent civilians,” Katz tweeted.

Colombia, once an ally of the Jewish state, has over the last two years moved to curb ties with Israel.

Petro, a long-time Israel critic, accused Israel of Nazism following the October 7th Hamas invasion of the Jewish state, and threatened to expel Israel’s ambassador to Colombia.

In March, Petro again compared the State of Israel to Nazi Germany, and declared that his country would impose an arms embargo on the Jewish state.

“Asking for food, more than 100 Palestinians were killed by Netanyahu. This is called genocide and is reminiscent of the Holocaust even if the world powers do not like to recognize it,” Petro wrote in Spanish on social media. “The world must block Netanyahu.”

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In late October, Colombia recalled its ambassador in protest of the invasion.

By Shiryn Ghermezian, The Algemeiner

Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Monday called on artists to hold a major concert in the country in solidarity with the Palestinians, while also falsely accusing Israel of committing ”genocide” in the Gaza Strip during its war against Hamas terrorists controlling the enclave.

Petro took to X/Twitter and shared a video of Grammy-winning Puerto Rican rapper Rene Perez Joglar, also known by his stage name Residente, claiming Israel is perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and asking other artists to denounce Israel’s defensive military campaign against Hamas. Petro then urged all artists to join him in a concert in Colombia’s capital, Bogotá, to protest Israel’s actions in Gaza.

“I would like Rene and everyone who wants to use art to criticize the genocide against the Palestinian people to join me in the Plaza de Bolivar or in Simon Bolivar Park in Bogotá in a great concert against genocide and for life,” he wrote on X. “Let a cry of humanity against infamy come out of Bogotá. And from there we went to Medellín, Cali and Barranquilla and the regions of Colombia, go out in caravans to find us in the middle of art and music to come together to shout Enough, stop the killing!”

Residente announced in December that he was postponing his new album and the release of several music videos because of what he claimed to be “the genocide that Israel is committing with US support against the Palestinian civilian population.” He also criticized others in the music industry for not denouncing the ”genocide” taking place in Gaza.

In late October, Petro recalled Colombia’s ambassador to Israel in protest of Israel’s military offensive against Hamas terrorists in Gaza. Israel launched its campaign in response to the deadly Oct. 7 massacre carried out by Hamas in southern Israel. Earlier that month, Israel’s Foreign Ministry announced that it was suspending defense exports to Colombia because Petro refused to condemn the Hamas atrocities and compared Israel’s ensuing military campaign to the conduct of Nazi Germany.

The two countries have deep military ties, as Israel has been one of Colombia’s main suppliers of war planes, surveillance equipment and assault rifles since the 1990s.

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