It has been two days of intense agenda. Meetings with the highest representatives of Israel, Palestine and Egypt. Exchanges of opinions. Sometimes, as with the Israeli leaders, opposing positions. Pedro Sánchez concludes a two-day tour of the Middle East with a conviction: the conditions do not exist for there to be a scenario of peace. Spain would like the four-day truce, in principle, to be more stable, but has noted that the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahuis not for the job.
The President of the Government has taken advantage of this tour to obtain first-hand the keys to the conflict and its state. Sánchez believes that Netanyahu is in a logic of war, he is in a “warlike position” and that his “language and objectives” are warlike, as he stated in an informal conversation with the journalists accompanying him.
Sánchez has sought to exhibit a balanced position, condemning the Hamas terrorist attack, but also Israel’s response. Meetings in which he has addressed himself the day after, but in which the feeling is that Israel is not on that stage, at that moment.
From Egypt, where Sánchez has gone at the invitation of Abdelfatah al-Sisi, has insisted on a two-state solution, Israeli and Palestinian, to resolve this conflict. “We have to be more serious,” said the President of the Government. “It is our responsibility as an international community to play a key role.” The desire of Spain and the European Union is that the specific truce that started this Friday would be more stable, but it is more the expression of a wish than a certainty.
“We must stop this catastrophe”, has been the message that Sánchez has sent. “The truce must be maintained. We have asked the authorities of both countries to negotiate this sustainable truce.”
Al-Sisi has also demanded that the international community take this issue seriously because, he considers, we have made decades of promises about the Palestinian state that never fully meet the aspirations of this people. “It has been addressed for 30 years and no progress has been made”said the president of Egypt, who has asked for this recognition and for the UN to exercise oversight.
What has been finalized in this meeting in Cairo, which was also attended by the Belgian Prime Minister, Alexander de Croo, is that to help the Egyptian authorities respond to the current crisis, Spain will deliver a shipment of medical supplies in the coming days. Around four tons of equipment will be delivered to Egyptian hospitals to increase their capacity to provide medical treatment to Gaza evacuees, and also to strengthen the Egyptian system.