Knowing the ban on serving Palestinians dictated by Israel to the Spanish consulate in Jerusalem in retaliation for the words of Yolanda Díaz, the head of Sumar’s list for the European elections, Estrella Galán, has downplayed the second vice president’s statement and leader of his formation by which he declared that “Palestine will be free from the river to the sea.” “It is only a motto and Sumar has always condemned any terrorist act” (…) “they have no content of any other nature,” she declared.
Galán spoke in this way this Friday after meeting together with the MEP and IU candidate for the European elections on Sumar’s list, Manu Pineda, and the delegate of the Polisario Front in Spain, Abdulah Arabi. The head of the list of the plurinational group has tried to reduce the controversy by emphasizing that “the slogans are the least important thing; The important thing is the facts and that there is a genocide in Gaza, people murdered at the hands of Netanyahu, his ministers and his Army,” she insisted.
The controversy arose on Wednesday when, at the same time that Pedro Sánchez announced the upcoming recognition of the Palestinian state by Spain, the second vice president of the coalition government published a video on the social network from the river to the sea.”
It is a slogan that has resonated strongly in recent weeks on various university campuses both nationally and internationally, during the camps and mobilizations that have arisen to condemn “the genocide” of Israel. Its origin dates back more than 100 years, it talks about the territory located between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, natural borders during the British mandate of Palestine, and has been used for decades by associations such as the United Nations, the Palestinian National Authority or the Palestine Liberation Organization, among many other actors in the Jewish world.
However, the phrase has also been used by the terrorist organization Hamas and that is what the Israeli ambassador to Spain, Rodica Radian-Gordon, has referred to, framing Díaz’s speech as a “clear call for the elimination of Israel by promoting hatred and violence”.
Returning to the phrase expressed by Díaz, the intervention of the second vice president has caused the Israeli Foreign Minister, Israel Katz, to give instructions this Friday to cut the connection between the Spanish embassy in Tel Aviv and the Palestinians and to announce the prohibition of the Spanish consulate in Jerusalem from “providing services to Palestinians in the West Bank.”
Katz has announced that the reason for this decision is Spain’s recognition of the Palestinian State and the “anti-Semitic call” of the vice president of the Spanish Government, Yolanda Díaz.
In this sense, the number one from Sumar to the European candidacy has stressed that “slogans are slogans, they have no content of any other nature and we from Sumar, and the vice president herself has condemned any terrorist act”, which is why she stressed that “There is nothing to question.”
“The genocide is confirmed not only with the murders, but also by starving a people,” he pointed out, while the En Comú deputy Aina Vidal recalled that the Spanish consul in Israel has the “obligation” to comply with the mandate of the government of Spain and its “political sense.”
“Defending the rights of the Palestinian people and specifically responding to the needs that may arise on a day-to-day basis there is an issue, I insist, not only of mandate here in Spain, but also has to do with respect for rights. humans,” he said in statements in Congress.
Vidal has regretted that the president of Israel “denies help” to those who “are suffering a genocide” while Galán has stressed that with Israel’s latest decision “what he wants is to hinder international relations with the countries that we are in favor of.” of the recognition of the Palestinian State.”
