MANILA, Philippines – The Department of Foreign Affairs, in a short statement on Monday, October 23, said it “completely disassociates itself” from statements made by its former chief, now Philippine Ambassador to the United Kingdom Teodoro Locsin Jr.

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“The Department of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of the Philippines completely disassociates itself from the statement made on Twitter by Ambassador Teodoro L. Locsin, Jr. Such statement was made in his strictly personal capacity,” DFA Spokesperson Teresita Daza said in a statement to media on Monday. 

Daza confirmed they were referring to Locsin’s “text referring to Palestine.”

In a now-deleted post over the social media platform X, Locsin said in a repost: “That’s why Palestinian children should be killed; they might grow up to become as gullible as innocent Palestinians letting Hamas launch rockets at Israel; not that they could stop them but that’s no excuse. They are Muslims. They could stage mass suicide attacks against Hamas until the latter ran out of bullets.”

Unrestricted by character limits on his verified X account, Locsin added: “You know, do it with the same courage as white people showed to win their freedom as in the cases of…uh, let’s see now, uh.….uh…well never mind. It’s a thought. The Saudi Prince is right: civil disobedience beat the British in India after 40 years although there was Amritsar but that was a one-off thing or maybe two or three. There was the Warsaw Uprising but that didn’t go well at all for the Poles though it went quickly: the Poles found freedom in the arms of Jesus. Like Filipinos they are Catholics but we’re smarter. Martyrdom we leave to our enemies.”

X, formerly called Twitter, is where Locsin is the most active online.

When he was the Philippines’ foreign affairs secretary, it was through Twitter that he’d issue statements, answer questions from the media, and even relay orders to personnel in the department. 

On Sunday, October 22, Locsin apologized to “those who did misconstrue my sentiments and did in fact get triggered.”

“I immediately deleted my sarcastic response to a tweet as I realized it could be misconstrued and retweeted to incite. My apologies to those who did misconstrue my sentiments and did in fact get triggered – I obviously was not advocating for the literal death of anyone, but rather simply for the end of any ideology that condones terrorism in any way, shape or form,” he said.

Locsin is both ambassador to the UK and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s “special envoy to China for special concerns.” 

Locsin’s “sarcastic” tweet comes as the death toll in the war between Israel and Hamas continues to rise. To date, over 1,400 Israelis have died in the war, while at least 4,600 Palestinians have been killed in war-torn Gaza and the West Bank.

Filipino nationals have also been caught in the crosshairs of the war – four Filipinos have been confirmed dead in Israel, while over 100 nationals are still stuck in Gaza. 

The DFA recently said all sides in the war “should do their utmost to protect civilians in times of war and armed conflict.” Manila had previously expressed its support for Israel following the militant Hamas’ attack on October 7.

Israel has since launched a relentless assault on Gaza, the purported base of Hamas. – Rappler.com