As Ireland, Spain and Norway prepare to formally recognize the Palestinian state, Israel has stepped up retaliation against the three countries through diplomatic means and online videos.
Israel expressed anger last week at preliminary announcements by the governments of Ireland, Spain and Norway, with Foreign Minister Israel Katz describing it as a “series of folly” and warning of “disastrous consequences”.
Dublin, Madrid and Oslo are due to confirm their recognition of a Palestinian state on Tuesday.
All three governments have faced backlash from Israel in recent days.
The two countries’ ambassadors to Israel were all invited to watch a video of the October 7 Israeli attack that sparked the Gaza war, which drew a rebuke from the Israeli foreign ministry. Israeli media filmed Irish ambassador Sonia McGuinness and the ambassadors of Spain and Norway watching the footage.
Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Miquel Martin said the treatment of the diplomats was “inappropriate and very wrong.”
Bobby McDonagh: Israel’s treatment of Irish ambassador was like a creepy medieval circus
But the Israeli government has signalled that its action against Ireland may not end there: Israel’s ambassador to Ireland, Dana Elrich, told The Irish Times there would be a review of bilateral relations covering everything from intelligence and security to the economy.
Israeli response has also taken the form of flamboyant online videos aimed at Ireland, Spain and Norway, portraying the decision to voice support for a Palestinian state as favouring Hamas.
One of the posts, published on the X platform and addressed to Prime Minister Simon Harris, featured footage of what appeared to be Hamas fighters performing traditional Irish dancing whilst ethnic music played.
(Israeli minister posts video of Irish dancers and Hamas fighters; Harris says decision to recognise Palestine ‘no surprise’)
“If the goal was to reward terrorism by expressing support for an Irish Palestinian state, that has been achieved,” Katz wrote above the video, which had similar videos in Norway and Spain, the latter showing flamenco dancing.
Spain’s Foreign Minister José Manuel Álvarez responded by calling the video “abhorrent” because it used symbols of Spanish identity such as flamenco.
Relations between Spain and Israel have been uneasy in recent months. Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has been one of the EU’s most vocal critics of Israel’s response to the October 7 attacks, and leaders of the far-left Podemos party, which until late last year was in a coalition government with Sánchez’s Socialists, have repeatedly called for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be tried for human rights violations.
Relations between the two countries deteriorated further just hours before Spain is due to express its support for a Palestinian state during a cabinet meeting.
“Palestine will be free from the river to the sea,” Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Yolanda Diaz of the left-wing Smar party said in a recorded video supporting the decision, in a statement condemned by the Israeli government as anti-Semitic.
Meanwhile, Spain’s Defense Minister Margarita Robles said in an interview that a “veritable genocide” was taking place in Gaza, the first time a member of Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist government had used the term.
Israel took further diplomatic steps, announcing that it would no longer allow the Spanish consulate in Jerusalem to carry out consular activities or provide consular services to Palestinian residents of the occupied West Bank.
“The days of the Inquisition are over,” Katz wrote to X. “Today, the Jewish people have a sovereign and independent state, and no one can force us to convert or threaten our existence. To those who harm us, we will harm them in return.”
The foreign ministers of Ireland, Spain and Norway met in Brussels on Monday and agreed to postpone any response to Israel’s actions until a later date.
Earlier this month, the Spanish government refused to allow a Danish-flagged ship to dock because it was transporting weapons from India to Haifa, Israel. Alvarez said it was the first time Spain had refused entry to a ship for that reason.
