Action and Communication on the Middle East (ACOM), the largest pro-Israel advocacy group in Spain, has announced a legal action against the decision of the city of Barcelona to end all of its ties with the State of Israel. The group called the decision by Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau and City Council ‘’anti-Semitic discrimination.’’
Colau notified Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that she is suspending all of the Spanish city’s ties with Israel.
“At the request of more than 100 entities and thousands of Barcelona neighbors, I have just communicated to Netanyahu that we suspend institutional relations with the State of Israel due to the repeated violations of human rights of the Palestinian population and non-compliance with United Nations resolutions,” she wrote on Facebook in Spanish, and on Instagram.
The city will maintain relations with “Israeli and Palestinian entities that continue to work for peace and against apartheid.”
The Mayor has the support and consent of her party as well as the non-constitutionalist parties of the Council, including Esquerra Republicana and the Catalan Socialist Party.
In 1998, Barcelona and Tel Aviv signed a friendship and cooperation agreement, which cemented the ties between the two Mediterranean cities.
‘’The Barcelona City Council has reached a new low by pushing Barcelona to the maximum expression of sectarianism and discrimination, becoming the most openly anti-Semitic city in Europe,’’ said ACOM.
‘’The Mayor is abusing her position and her powers by using the institutions to advance her agenda of hatred and her sickly obsession against Jews and their state. This seriously affects the welfare of Spanish Jews and Israeli nationals in the city,’’ it added.
‘’This tops hostile activities and initiatives carried out by leftist parties and Catalan separatism in recent years). As ACOM already condemned a few weeks ago, Colau and her accomplices have a problem and that problem is called anti-Semitism,’’ the group said.
Lior Haiat, spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, called the decision “unfortunate” and “in complete contrast to the position of the majority of the residents of Barcelona and their representatives in the city council.”
“The decision gives support to extremists, terrorist organizations and antisemitism, and impairs the interests of the residents of Barcelona,” he added. “The friendship between Israel and Barcelona is long-standing, and is based on shared culture and values. Even this unfortunate decision will not damage this friendship.”
The official Twitter account of the Palestinian BDS National Committee hailed the decision. “We call on institutions worldwide to follow suit and end ties with apartheid Israel!” it posted.
“With the current Israeli government, the most far-right, racist, sexist and homophobic ever, accountability is more needed than ever to end its impunity and #DismantleApartheid,” the group posted on its website. “We call on institutions worldwide to follow in Barcelona’s footsteps and end their own involvement in sustaining Israeli crimes against humanity.”
When it called the Israeli government the most far-right ever, the group did not comment on the history of violence and hatred in Spain, including more than 350 years during which the Spanish Inquisition operated. There was an Inquisition tribunal in Barcelona.