The Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, has rejected the video released by the Israeli Government in which the three ambassadors of the countries that on Tuesday announced their recognition of the Palestinian State (Spain, Norway and Ireland) are seen watching images of the kidnapping of Jewish soldiers in the Hamas attack on October 7 in the framework of the “reprimand” to which Israeli diplomacy subjected these diplomats yesterday precisely for the recognition of the Palestinian State by their respective countries.
“It is something that we reject,” said Albares in an interview on RAC1, in which he also advanced a protest against the Israeli decision to cut the connection between the Spanish Embassy in Tel Aviv and the Palestinians; as well as prohibiting the Spanish consulate in Jerusalem from “providing services to Palestinians in Judea and Samaria” due to the “anti-Semitic call” of the vice president of the Spanish Government, Yolanda Díaz, who closed a party video with the pro-Palestinian slogan “from the river to the sea”, which the Hebrews interpret as the elimination of Israel.
Regarding the words of the leader of Sumar, from which he has distanced himself, Albares has warned that in matters of Spanish foreign policy, one thing is the opinions of a citizen and another thing is the political lines set by the President of the Government and he. himself as Foreign Minister.
The head of Spanish diplomacy explained that he has spoken with his counterparts from Norway and Ireland about the video of the three ambassadors who were summoned to Tel Aviv and who “are on the line.” For Albares, summoning an ambassador is “a diplomatic figure that exists” and that Spain makes use of it when it considers it convenient, but he has criticized that “what is outside the diplomatic uses and the guarantees that an ambassador must have in a country is to film it” and he recalled that ambassadors enjoy a “very particular status” and that among their “privileges and immunities this type of public exhibition and filming is excepted.”
Albares has also responded to his Israeli counterpart, Israel Katz, about the new limitations that he has imposed on the Spanish diplomatic representation in Israel. The minister has indicated that the Government is going to analyze the announcement and “of course if this is a decision as it is read literally” then “we will protest”, including as possibilities from a verbal note to calling the ambassador for consultations. “We will analyze what it means that they will not be able to serve Palestinians. We want to see what they say exactly. If it is as they say, it is clear that we will protest,” warned the minister, for whom “no one can intimidate us into asking for a ceasefire, the release of the hostages and recognizing the State of Palestine.”
Katz, in a message on the social network In this regard, Albares, who has acknowledged not speaking with the second vice president of foreign policy and has distanced himself from her words, has defended that there are no anti-Semites in the Executive. “It is a tolerant, plural and diverse Government that does not accept any hate speech,” he assured, adding that “anti-Semitic attitudes not only have no place in the Government of Spain, but we fight them.” Faced with these accusations, Albares has asked himself “how can we not believe in the State of Israel if we believe that the solution is that of two States” that “have to exist peacefully.”
“I don’t have to tell the vice president what she should do or not do,” the minister added regarding Yolanda Díaz’s words. ”But I do tell you that the line in foreign policy is set by the President of the Government and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; and our statement is that we believe in the existence of the State of Israel,” he clarified. ”We have said many times that the recognition of the State of Palestine is closely linked to security in Israel,” added the Foreign Minister.
However, Albares wanted to vindicate the “truly historic decision” to recognize the Palestinian State and has defended that until next Tuesday “we all have to join forces so that what is talked about is the recognition of the Palestinian State, the situation of the Palestinians in Gaza, and of solidarity with the Palestinians.”
“We do not have to allow anyone, through their overacting, to cloud this conversation, which is what should be had,” he claimed, in apparent reference to the reaction of Beniamin Netanyahu’s Government, which had already called its ambassador in Spain for consultations. Rodica Radian-Gordon, and summoned the Spanish ambassador in Tel Aviv, Ana María Salomon. “Let’s not let those who want to permanently make the two-state solution impossible to triumph,” she demanded.
Regarding the configuration of the future Palestinian State, the head of diplomacy explained that the Spanish position is that it should be under the control of the Palestinian National Authority both in Gaza, now controlled by Hamas, and in the West Bank. He has also opted to unite both territories by a corridor and to give them access to the sea with a port and provide it with a capital that should be, in his opinion, East Jerusalem.