Before traveling to the United Arab Emirates to participate today in the climate summit being held in Dubai – where he will meet again with the president of Israel, Isaac Herzog –, Pedro Sánchez left the fuse of a new diplomatic conflict with the State lit yesterday. Hebrew, the second in just two weeks.
“I have sincere doubts that they are complying with international humanitarian law,” acknowledged the President of the Government on TVE, in his first interview in this new mandate, in the face of the military offensive deployed by Israel in the Gaza Strip, which now totals more than 13,000 dead, almost half of them children.
The reaction of the Israeli Prime Minister, Beniamin Netanyahu, to Sánchez’s statements was, once again, angry and withering. After calling his words “shameful,” “on the same day that Hamas terrorists are murdering Israelis in our capital, Jerusalem,” Netanyahu ordered, as he did on November 24, to immediately summon the Spanish ambassador in Israel, Ana Salomón, to convey a harsh “reprimand.”
But this time the diplomatic crisis escalated one step further, and the Israeli Foreign Minister, Eli Cohen, called his ambassador in Spain, Rodica Radian-Gordon, to Jerusalem for consultations.
“Following the outrageous statements by the President of the Spanish Government, who once again repeated unfounded accusations, I decided to summon our ambassador in Spain to hold consultations in Jerusalem,” Cohen announced.
“Israel is acting and will continue to act in accordance with international law and will continue the war until all the hostages are returned and Hamas is eliminated from Gaza,” said the Israeli Foreign Minister.
“A single entity is responsible for the October 7 massacre and the current situation in the Gaza Strip: the terrorist organization Hamas,” Cohen stressed. And he stressed that Hamas “is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity against citizens of Israel, as well as residents in the Gaza Strip.”
After the tour of the Middle East with which he began his new mandate, and which culminated at the Rafah border crossing – the southern gate of Gaza – opening the door for Spain to recognize the State of Palestine even unilaterally if the EU delays its decision, Sánchez insisted yesterday on questioning Israel’s devastating reaction in the Gaza Strip, after the Hamas terrorist attacks.
Despite the diplomatic clash already registered last week, in response to the words that the Spanish president and the Belgian Prime Minister, Alexander de Croo, spoke in Rafah, Sánchez warned yesterday that the situation of relations with Israel was already “correct.”
That day, Cohen summoned the ambassadors of Spain and Belgium in Israel for “a harsh conversation of reprimand,” in response to words that Netanyahu’s government interpreted as “support for terrorism.” The Spanish Government, in turn, summoned the Israeli ambassador in Madrid to ask for explanations regarding accusations that she called “totally false and unacceptable.”
Since then, the waters seemed to have returned to normal, until yesterday when the diplomatic conflict was revived. “Friendly countries also have to tell each other the truth,” Sánchez justified yesterday, before the relationship with Israel caught fire again.
Sánchez assured that from the first moment he condemned the terrorist attacks by Hamas. “What Hamas did in Israel is absolutely despicable, execrable,” he stressed. And he recalled that in his last meeting with Netanyahu, last week in Jerusalem, “I had to watch Hamas attacks and crimes in Israel for 20 minutes, and it was very sad and very hard to see the images that the Israeli Government showed us about those attacks. ”.
He thus reiterated his “condemnation and rejection” of these attacks by the Islamist organization that governs Gaza and demanded the release of the hostages who remain kidnapped, “without any conditions and immediately.”
“But with the same conviction, we also have to tell Israel that it has to sustain its actions based on international humanitarian law. And with the images we are seeing, and the growing number, especially of boys and girls, who are dying, I have sincere doubts that they are complying with this international humanitarian law,” Sánchez warned yesterday on TVE.
And the box of thunder was reopened with Netanyahu
The Spanish president insisted that “it is evident that we have to propose a political solution to end this crisis.” That political solution, in his opinion, only “passes through the recognition of the Palestinian State.”
In 2014, the Congress of Deputies already approved a non-law proposal, unanimously, which demanded that the Government recognize the Palestinian State. But Sánchez alleged that that same resolution linked this recognition to other European countries joining in, so that they “took the step at the same time as Spain.” Sánchez recalled that more than 140 countries around the world already recognize the Palestinian State, including European countries such as Hungary and Sweden, which did so unilaterally.
“The situation has changed,” Sánchez warned, to justify his position, because he assured that the Arab countries demand “facts,” and not more peace agreements that are later broken. “We have to sit down to reach an agreement on facts, and those facts are that the West, that Europe, recognizes the Palestinian State,” he insisted that the Arab countries demand. “And I think they are right, because during all these years we have seen how Israel, systematically, has been occupying Palestinian territory, in the West Bank. And now we see what is happening in Gaza. Therefore, we have to address that debate,” he defended.
“First, out of a moral conviction, because what we are seeing in Gaza is not acceptable. And what is going to be done in Gaza after this spiral of violence ends is not acceptable either,” Sánchez stressed.
But also for Europe’s own geopolitical interest, he argued, since the expansion of the conflict to Lebanon, Egypt or Jordan could destabilize the entire Mediterranean. “Can Europe really allow itself to have two open war fronts, one in Ukraine and the other in the Middle East? Politics and diplomatic channels have to prevail,” he claimed.