The leaders of the Governments of Spain and Belgium, which hold the current and the next six-month European presidency, meet on Thursday with the Israeli Prime Minister, in Israel, and with the president of the Palestinian Authority, in the West Bank, who was released this Thursday on Monday.
According to sources from the Madrid Government, Pedro Sánchez and Alexander de Croo will travel together on Thursday to Israel and the West Bank and will meet with the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the leader of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas.
The presence of Sánchez and Croo aims to convey the position of the European Union (EU) on the war between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas to the political leaders of Israel and the Palestinian Authority, stated the same sources, cited by several media. Spanish people.
In recent weeks, since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, other European leaders have been in both territories, including French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, and the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell.
This will be Pedro Sánchez’s first official trip since he was re-elected as Prime Minister last week, in a session of the Spanish Parliament in which he defended “Israel’s immediate ceasefire in Gaza” and pledged “to work in Spain and in Europe”, for the recognition of the Palestinian State.
“We demand Israel’s immediate ceasefire in Gaza and strict compliance with international humanitarian law, which is clearly not being respected,” he said.
Sánchez asked that there be no doubt that Spain, which currently holds the six-month presidency of the Council of the European Union and will pass this testimony to Belgium on January 1, “is with Israel in the rejection and response to the terrorist attack” in October by Hamas.
“But with the same clarity we reject the indiscriminate killing of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank,” he added, before defending the immediate entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza and the holding of an international peace conference that opens the doors to diplomacy and recognition. of Palestinian statehood by the international community.
The leader of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE) even took on the “first commitment” of the new legislature in Spain to “work, in Spain and in Europe” for the recognition of the Palestinian State.
Hamas, a Palestinian extremist group considered terrorist by the EU and the United States, has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007, from where some three thousand of its militants launched an unprecedented attack against southern Israel on October 7.
The attack caused 1,200 deaths, according to Israeli authorities, who responded with a declaration of war on Hamas and an offensive against Gaza that, according to the Islamist group, has killed more than 13,000 people.
According to the UN, Israel’s offensive in Gaza has already displaced 1.7 million people.
Source: TSF
