The visit of the President of the Government to Israel has been the first stop of the tour that Pedro Sánchez carries out together with his Belgian counterpart Alexander de Croo in the Middle East.

Sánchez met last Thursday with the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, before whom he defended that the fight against terrorism after the Hamas attacks It can’t be by force alonebut rather a horizon of peace and security must be offered.

The Spanish president expressed solidarity with the Israelis for the attacks carried out on October 7 and recognized their right to defend themselves. However, he recalled that Israel “must comply with international legality.”

In Jerusalem and before the Israeli leaders, Sánchez insisted that “The response must not involve the death of civilians in Gaza” and reiterated the need to protect “all civilians” and for humanitarian aid to “immediately enter Gaza.” “The number of dead Palestinians is truly unbearable,” he said.

Likewise, the President of the Government claimed in the presence of Netanyahu the urgent recognition of a Palestinian state and, from the Rafah border crossing, he opened the door to unilateral recognition of Palestine by Spain.

“The time has come for the international community and especially the EU to make a decision on the recognition of the Palestinian State,” Sánchez declared. “It would be worth it and it would be important for us to do it together. If that doesn’t happen, of course Spain will make its own decisions,” she said.

Sánchez’s words have not pleased Israel

Israel’s reaction to Pedro Sánchez’s statements has been immediate. The Israeli Foreign Ministry has summoned this Friday the ambassadors of Spain and Belgium in retaliation for the “false” statements made by the President of the Spanish Government and the Belgian Prime Minister, since they consider that it represents a “support for terrorism” of Hamas.

For his part, the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, has “roundly” condemned the statements of Sánchez and his Belgian counterpart, as he believes that the two leaders They did not clearly point out Hamas for attacks, including attacks against Israeli citizens and the use of Palestinian civilians as “human shields”.

Foreign Affairs summons the Israeli ambassador in Spain for the “unacceptable” accusations against Sánchez

In our country, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, has responded to his Israeli counterpart by summoning the Israeli ambassador in Spain to give “explanations” for the “unacceptable and false” accusations against Pedro Sánchez and Alexander de Croo.

“They are especially serious because it is also about the President of the Government, who has the Presidency of the European Union, and the Prime Minister, who represents the country that will have it from January 1, which is Belgium,” he said. the minister

In this sense, Albares has admitted that He is not aware that Israel is concerned that Spain opens the door to unilaterally recognizing Palestineso it will be the ambassador who will give the “explanations” for the Israeli Government’s statement with words that “are completely false, inappropriate and completely out of the ordinary,” she insisted.

“The recognition of the State of Palestine is an electoral promise of the PSOE. It is part of the program of the progressive coalition Government and there are 140 countries in the world that recognize it,” explained the minister, while recalling that Spain condemned from the first moment the attack against Israel “by a terrorist organization like Hamas.”

Albares also recalled that the Spanish Government has requested “the immediate and unconditional release of the hostages”. “We have recognized Israel’s right to defend itself, but also, with the same force, we have raised our voices to make it clear that this defense has to be done within Humanitarian Law and to protect Palestinian civilian victims,” ​​he said. “We are talking about thousands and thousands of Palestinian civilian deaths, including girls and boys, and our humanitarian aid has to be for them,” she added.

Finally, the Minister of Foreign Affairs has indicated that Spain “is and always will be in the field of peace”demanding an International Peace Conference “that gives rise to a realistic and viable Palestinian State”, that coexists peacefully with Israel.

It is not the first clash between Israel and Spain

Before the disagreement between Israel and Spain after the visit of Pedro Sánchez, last October there was another clash after the Israeli ambassador in Spain accuse members of the Government of aligning themselves with ISIS-type terrorism in reference to the attack by Hamas against Israel, and after the statements of the then Minister of Social Rights Ione Belarra in favor of the Palestinian cause.