MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Spanish minister wants the world to isolate Israel

Belarra called for “economic sanctions against Netanyahu and his political leadership, and to bring before the international criminal court all the political leaders who are pressing.” Photo: EFE

After Bolivia severed diplomatic ties with Israel in the aftermath of the ongoing crisis in the Middle East, Spain’s Social Rights Minister Ione Belarra said Wednesday that her country and the rest of the world should follow suit due to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ”planned genocide” against the people of Palestine.

“I am also calling on my country and other countries to break diplomatic relations with Israel because that would send the right political message and that is that we want nothing to do with a war criminal,” Belarra told Qatari TV broadcaster Al Jazeera while urging Netanyahu to stop the “planned genocide that he is carrying out against the people of Palestine.”

“It is essential that the international community and particularly the European Union take a firm position and stop the Government of Israel and particularly Netanyahu because if the Israeli government can do this, it is because it has enjoyed total impunity in the international community thanks to having a very powerful alliance with the United States,” she underlined.

Belarra also claimed that Israel’s actions were “a global threat to democracy because they are doing it to the people of Palestine, tomorrow they can do it to anyone.” She also questioned the “deafening silence” of so many countries, particularly in the European Union (EU).

She also called for “economic sanctions against Netanyahu and his political leadership, and to bring before the international criminal court all the political leaders who are pressing the button.”

The minister insisted massive bombardments against the civilian population were “ a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law” because “hospitals, schools, UN personnel cannot be military targets, they cannot be the target of these attacks.”

Meanwhile, Netanyahu insisted there would be no ceasefire “without the release of our hostages“ captured during the Oct. 7 attacks b y Hamas against Israeli territory.

”I want to put aside all kinds of vain rumors heard from all sides and repeat one thing clearly: there will be no ceasefire without the release of our hostages,” Netanyahu stressed in a meeting with Jewish settlers in the West Bank amid mounting international pressure for a humanitarian ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

Israel declared war on Hamas on October 7 following an attack by the Islamist group that left more than 1,400 dead and some 240 hostages, while the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip has left more than 10,500 dead, 26,400 wounded and 2,550 missing, most of them civilians.