Spain increases aid to Palestine to $22.4Mln, preparing more: Minister

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
24 Oct 2023 07:59

The Spanish Foreign Minister declared his support for Palestine and announced increasing aid to the devastated land.

Spain's Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares speaks in Islamabad, Pakistan, September 10, 2021. (AP)

Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares said on Tuesday that the Spanish government has raised humanitarian aid to Palestine to 21 million euros ($22.4 million) and expects to triple this amount in the near future.

"What Palestine needs at the moment is more aid, not less. This has been taken into account in the [European] Commission's actions, and today the commissioner in charge of humanitarian assistance reiterated that assistance to Gaza will be increased threefold ... And, of course, we have been at the forefront of defending this position and have increased our aid to Palestine to 21 million euros. And we are working to announce a doubling of this amount very soon," Albares told reporters after the Foreign Affairs Council in Luxembourg.

Furthermore, Albarez recommended organizing an international peace conference following what he described as a "Palestinian-Israeli conflict" based on the "two-state plan". The Spanish minister stated that such a summit may be held in Spain.

This comes after Spain’s Minister for Social Rights Ione Belarra condemned "Israel" for plotting a "planned genocide" in Gaza, as she described the siege on the Strip as an act of "collective punishment" potentially constituting a "war crime".

She continued to urge the people of Spain to take to the streets and demand to refrain from joining the US' unwavering support for "Israel", urging the Global South to come up with a solution.

"Today we want to raise our voice to denounce that the state of Israel is carrying out a planned genocide in the Gaza Strip, leaving hundreds of thousands without light, food, and water and carrying out bombings on the civilian population that are collective punishment, seriously breach international law and may be considered war crimes,” she expressed.