Ibsen Martínez is a Venezuelan journalist and writer and there follows my - slightly shortened - translation of a recent op-ed piece by him in El País of Madrid.

The capacity of Hugo Chávez to bolster his unspeakable incapacity to govern by resort to exuberant fighting talk is well known. However, the condemnation of the Israeli offensive in Gaza which led him, at the beginning of January, to expel the Israeli ambassador to Venezuela was enmeshed in trappings as grotesque as they were irresponsible. Think about this; the decree expelling the ambassador was read out at a Caracas mosque by two ministers wearing keffiyahs.

Such an irresponsible act could not fail to encourage the grave vandalism carried out [ …] in a Sephardi synagogue in Caracas and the serious threats which now confront the Jewish community in my country, one of the oldest in Latin America, along with those in Argentina and Brazil [ …] Adding another hatred to the menu of hatreds with which Chavism has orientated its political project demonstrated a monstrous irresponsibility evident from the moment when the response to the conflict in the Middle East was no longer channeled in solely diplomatic terms and instead engaged itself in crude criticisms of the religious feeling to be found in almost all human beings.

These words and deeds were, of course, enthusiastically welcomed by Hamas and Hezbollah and you can be sure that Israel won’t forget them. The maniacal intemperance of Chávez has achieved nothing apart from allowing the damaging influence of fundamentalist Islamic terrorism to take root in Latin America, with all the forebodings that must accompany it.

This frivolous attempt to use all means to make Venezuela a global actor only flatters the disposition of a certain kind of postmodern left to substitute feelings for emotions. It’s obvious that for Chávez to distance himself equally from the brutal military policies of Israel and the terrorism of Hamas would have meant the end of him as the star showgirl of the Oliver Stone left.

Chávez has thus revealed the distinctive marks of postmodern and politically correct antisemitism, which uses the excuse of solidarity with the sufferings of the Palestinians to swaddle itself in ancient Judeophobia and which, of course, refuses to recognize itself for what it is.