Spain’s frayed relationship with Israel has been further damaged after Jerusalem accused it of enabling the glorification of terrorism and the celebration of crimes against humanity by allowing a pro-Palestinian organisation to hold events in Madrid.
Masar Badil, also known as the Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement, held its annual conference in the Spanish capital last week, followed by a demonstration on Sunday. Founded in 2021, it describes itself as “a popular resistance movement confronting Zionist colonialism and the project of liquidation and surrender”.
The Israeli foreign ministry responded to the events by posting on social media that it was “outraged and saddened that Spain has become a paradise to sow hatred and incite […] the destruction of Israel”. It said that Masar Badil had links to terrorist groups and had celebrated the October 7th Hamas-led attack on Israel.
“It is unacceptable that a democratic society allows the glorification of terrorism and the celebration of crimes against humanity perpetrated by Hamas,” the ministry wrote.
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Spanish-Israeli relations have been fragile for much of the last year. Spain’s Socialist prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has repeatedly supported Israel’s right to defend itself in the wake of the October 7th attack. However, he has also been one of Europe’s most forthright critics of the Israeli military response.
Calls by members of Mr Sánchez’s former coalition partners on the far left for Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu to face trial for war crimes also damaged bilateral ties. But Spain’s decision earlier this year, alongside Ireland and Norway, to acknowledge a Palestinian state drew a particularly fierce response from Israel, which described it as “a parade of stupidity” and posted videos online mocking all three countries.
The Spanish foreign minister, José Manuel Albares, said he had not known about the Masar Badil events and that Israel’s claims about his country in relation to them were “totally inappropriate”.
“Spain is a country of tolerance, it’s a country where, of course, you can live freely and have freedom of expression and where any form of incitement to hate, including of course anti-Semitism – and today is a good day to remember that – is not just rejected by all Spanish society but also by the penal code,” he said.
He said that any accusation of hate speech or racism could be processed through legal channels.
The Spanish foreign ministry issued a statement condemning last year’s attack on Israel by Hamas, coinciding with its anniversary. However, Mr Albares has also reiterated Madrid’s support for the South African accusation of genocide against Israel in the International Court of Justice.
A military aircraft is expected to evacuate Spanish nationals from Lebanon on Wednesday. Last week, two Spanish aircraft took 243 people from Spain and several other nations out of the country.
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