The right-wing mayor of Barcelona, Spain, has temporarily severed ties with Israel over human rights violations in Palestine.
Barcelona Mayor Ada Colao has written to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that the Barcelona City Council is severing its ties with Israel until Israel ends its systematic violations of the human rights of the Palestinian people.
He wrote that we have decided to sign a twinning agreement with Israeli state institutions and the Tel Aviv City Council until the end of Israel’s systematic violations of the rights of the Palestinian people in accordance with international laws and United Nations resolutions. Agreement) is cancelled.
The mayor of Barcelona wrote that we cannot sit quietly, but this boycott will not apply to Israeli and Palestinian citizens who are engaged in efforts to establish peace in the Middle East.
Barcelona Mayor Ada Colao said that the city council itself cannot interfere in international affairs, but this decision to sever ties with Israel is being made based on petitions written by 100 groups and 4,000 people.
He said that Barcelona was asked by the Organization for International Justice, a federation of more than 100 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), to cancel the twinning agreement with Tel Aviv in response to Israeli airstrikes on Gaza in May 2021. should be done
On the other hand, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel disapproved of the actions of the mayor of Barcelona and called it a violation of the wishes of the citizens of Barcelona.
After the measures taken by the mayor of Barcelona, the parties included in the coalition government of the leftist party in Barcelona have also expressed their concerns, but no reaction has come out on the matter from the government of Spain yet.
