Spain Summons Israeli Diplomat Over Remarks By Netanyahu's Office

(MENAFN- Kuwait News Agency (KUNA)) MADRID, Sept 12 (KUNA) -- Spain's Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares summoned on Friday Israeli occupation charge d'affaires in Madrid over the recent comments about Spain made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office, Spain's foreign ministry said.
Albares summoned Dana Erlich to "categorically reject the false and slanderous statements from Netanyahu's office", the ministry added in a statement.
The statement stressed that Spain defends the two-state solution that helps the two sides live side by side with mutual guarantees for their safety and security, it noted.
This is the only way for peace and Spanish people are a friend to both Israeli and Palestinian people, it stated.
This escalation continues after Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced last Monday a package of measures, in response to what he described as "genocide" in Gaza.
The steps included a total arms embargo, vessels carrying fuel, which head to Israel through Spanish ports and more. Sanchez said the move is aimed at "stopping the genocide in Gaza" and "supporting the Palestinian population".
"There is a difference between defending your country and bombing hospitals or starving innocent children," he added in a speech posted from his official X account.
Sanchez went to say "Spain, as you know, doesn't have nuclear bombs, nor aircraft carriers, nor large oil reserves. We alone can't stop the Israeli offensive, but that doesn't mean we won't stop trying, because there are causes worth fighting for even if it's not in our sole power to win them".
In its reply, Netanyahu's office accused Sanchez of making "a blatant genocidal threat on the world's only Jewish state".
"Apparently, the Spanish Inquisition, the expulsion of the Jews of Spain and the systematic mass murder of Jews in the Holocaust, is not enough for Sanchez. Incredible," it elaborated.
The Israeli occupation authorities announced the ban of two Spanish ministers from entering the occupied territories.
As a result, Albares declared that Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, both extremists in the occupation government, would be banned from entering Spanish territory and placed on the list of persons subject to sanctions.
He noted that they would be included in the Schengen Information System (SIS). (end)
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