Brazilian citizens who were born in Yerushalayim will no longer have Israel listed as their country of birth on their passports, the Foreign Ministry in Brasilia has decided.
The Embassy of Brazil told the Folha de Sao Paulo daily that the decision to remove Israel from such documents was made last year, but was only recently brought to the attention of the media in Brazil, which was warned by Brazilian Israelis affected by the change in policy.
The following countries also omit Israel as the country of birth from their citizens who were born in Yerushalayim: the United States, Canada and France.
The Folha de Sao Paulo Daily reported that approximately 60 of about 15,000 Brazilian Israelis have been affected by the decision.
In a statement published on Friday, Floriano Passero, a Brazilian-Jewish opposition lawmaker, condemned the decision as “arbitrary” and explained that the move “will only reinforce the Brazilian government’s biased views of Israel.”
He said that “regardless of the path to peace between the two peoples, Jerusalem certainly will remain an inseparable part of Israel and a citizen born in Jerusalem has every right to display their country of birth: Israel.”
Passero serves in the country’s federal lower house and is the social affairs minister for the State of Sao Paulo. i24 News
{Matzav.com Israel}
