Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte To Dedicate Holocaust Monument In Israel

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Rodrigo Duterte, making the first visit to Israel by a president of the Philippines, will participate in the inauguration of a monument to Filipinos who rescued Jews during the Holocaust.

Duterte, whose four-day visit to the Jewish state begins on Sunday, will dedicate a memorial located in a park in Rishon LeZion, located near Tel Aviv in central Israel.

His trip will include a visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial museum in Jerusalem, as well as meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Reuven Rivlin.

Israel and the Philippines established diplomatic ties in 1957.

Duterte, who has been president since 2016, in that year compared his campaign against drug dealers to the Holocaust, and said he would kill dealers like Hitler killed Jews, Haaretz reported.

“Critics compare me to Hitler’s cousin,” he said. “Hitler massacred 3 million Jews … there’s 3 million drug addicts. There are. I’d be happy to slaughter them.”

“If Germany had Hitler, the Philippines would have …,” he said and pointed to himself.

Duterte apologized for the Hitler comments during his October 2016 Rosh Hashanah speech at a synagogue in Manila. Following the apology, he talked about the quality of Israeli arms and asked the congregants to “Please, ask your people who are here to sell us arms.”

He is facing two complaints of murder and crimes against humanity in the International Criminal Court.

Alyssa Fisher is a news writer at the Forward. Email her at [email protected], or follow her on Twitter at @alyssalfisher

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.