No halftones. Pedro Sánchez went to the grain during the meeting he held yesterday in Jerusalem with Benjamin Netanyahu. “Israel has the right to self-defense”, he acknowledged before the Prime Minister of the Hebrew State after the terrorist attacks by Hamas on October 7, which caused a thousand Jewish deaths and around 300 kidnapped that will now begin to be exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in the agreed truce.
“But allow me to be clear”, warned the Spanish president. And, in addition to urging him to comply with international law, in the face of the Israeli military offensive in the Gaza Strip, which has already killed more than 13,000 Palestinians, including up to 5,000 children, he demanded: “We to urgently stop the humanitarian catastrophe”.
“The terrible suffering of hundreds of thousands of people in Palestine is atrocious”, said Sánchez to Netanyahu in the meeting they held in the Knesset. “The whole world is shocked by the images we see every day coming from Gaza. The number of dead Palestinians is truly unbearable. Military operations must clearly distinguish between terrorist objectives and the protection of the civilian population”, he denounced.
Sánchez communicated to Netanyahu the same forceful messages previously expressed to the president of Israel, Isaac Herzog. “With the same decision, clarity and courage”, emphasized the delegation accompanying the Spanish president, giving relevance to their words before the Prime Minister of Israel. “With serenity”, they insisted, but without modulating their position.
Netanyahu received Sánchez and the Prime Minister of Belgium, Alexander de Croo – who accompanies him on the tour of the Middle East -, showing them, first of all, a video with very harsh scenes and extreme violence, according to they were defined by government sources, from Hamas attacks on the Israeli civilian population. Some images with which the Prime Minister of Israel wanted to make his visitors understand his reaction to attacking the Gaza Strip.
“Hamas is a cruel and inhumane enemy that wants to eliminate the Jewish State. They are the new Nazis”, replied Netanyahu. “If they emerge victorious from here, they will try to destroy the Middle East and then go to Europe. It is not an exaggeration”, warned the Israeli president. “If you don’t fight the barbarians, they will win”, he concluded.
Sánchez referred to the same history of Spain: “Because we have also suffered it in Spain, I am convinced that terrorism cannot be eradicated exclusively through the use of force”, he warned Netanyahu. “For decades, Spain suffered the scourge of terrorism, and we can understand very well the pain and frustration of Israel”, he said in reference to ETA. “The atrocities committed by the terrorist organization Hamas are absolutely shocking”, admitted the Spanish president.
Sánchez demanded from Netanyahu the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza, “immediately, on a large scale and regularly”. “It is urgent to avoid the risk of more people dying of hunger.” And, in addition, he raised his proposal for a political solution. “We must start working from now on the application of the two-state solution. Today more than ever, we need to resume a serious and credible peace perspective. Without a political solution, we are once again plunged into endless cycles of violence”, he defended.
After their meetings with Netanyahu and Herzog, Sánchez and De Croo – current and next president of the Council of the European Union – traveled to the kibbutz of Be’eri, one of those that were savagely attacked by Hamas on the 7 of October The president, equipped with a bulletproof vest, assured that he felt “shocked” by the scene of the tragedy, which he toured with the Israeli military commanders, who explained to him some of the bloodiest episodes suffered there.
The entourage then went to Ramallah, the administrative capital of the West Bank, where Sánchez and De Croo met with the president of the Palestinian National Authority (PA), Mahmud Abbas. The Spanish president had already defended before the highest Israeli political authorities that the ANP should in the future also take over the Gaza Strip, alongside the West Bank and East Jerusalem. And in front of Abbas, he also expressed the need to fight terrorism, after describing Hamas’s attacks on Israel as “unacceptable”.
As he also did before Herzog and Netanyahu, Sánchez reiterated before Abbas Spain’s commitment to the two-state solution. So that the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people for an independent, viable State that coexists in peace and security alongside Israel become a reality, he told him.
The two-state solution, according to Sánchez, “is the best way to defeat terrorism and guarantee security in Israel.” And in order to move towards this political solution, he reiterated to all parties his proposal to have an international peace conference, with the participation of Israel and Palestine, held within a six-month horizon, as envisaged by the Spanish Government , and with the support of the international community.
After the meeting with Abbas, Sánchez returned to Tel-Aviv to catch the plane bound for Cairo, the third stop on this tour of the Middle East.
