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President-elect Jair Bolsonaro reiterated on Thursday that he was planning to transfer the Brazilian Embassy to Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, joining the United States and Guatemala.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quickly welcomed the plan.
In a tweet on Thursday, Bolsonaro said: "As we have already indicated during our campaign, we intend to transfer the Brazilian Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Sovereign state and we will respect it duly. "
This is the first time since his election on Sunday that Bolsonaro has mentioned his plan to move the embassy.
In Israel, Netanyahu issued a statement praising Bolsonaro. "I congratulate my friend President-elect of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, for his intention to move the Brazilian Embassy to Jerusalem, a historic, just and exciting milestone!"
Netanyahu spoke to Bolsonaro earlier this week, congratulating him on his victory and inviting him to visit Israel.
If Bolsonaro kept its commitments, Brazil would become the third country to have an embassy in Jerusalem, after the United States and Guatemala. Paraguay also briefly relocated its embassy to Jerusalem, bringing it back to Tel Aviv after the election of its new president, Mario Abdo Benitez.
Palestinians claim that East Jerusalem, which was captured by Israel during the 1967 Middle East War, would be the capital of a future state. Israel claims the entire city, including the eastern sector, home to Jerusalem's most important religious sites, as the eternal capital.
Most countries have embassies in Tel Aviv, claiming that the final status of Jerusalem must be determined by negotiations.
Some Brazilians have expressed concerns about this idea, saying it would hurt relations between Brazil and Muslim countries.
The former Brazilian ambassador to the United States, Rubens Barbosa, warned that such a move could harm Brazil's poultry exports. He added that Brazil would "waste $ 6 billion a year on poultry sales to Arab countries".
