Spanish city calls for arms boycott against Israel

The council of the Spanish city of Pamplona has set in motion an anti-Israel resolution to boycott arms trade.

By: World Israel News Staff

The council of the Spanish city of Pamplona has called on the Spanish government to stop its arms trade with Israel and on their municipality to declare Israeli officials as “persona non grata” until Israel stops its “oppressive policy against the Palestinian people”, Israel’s Ynet news reported Wednesday.

The resolution, passed by the heads of the factions in the Pamplona municipality, the capital of the Navarre province, also expressed support of the Palestinian “right of return” and the Palestinians’ right to hold a peaceful protest “which has allegedly “been suppressed with force by the Israeli army.”

The resolution also called on European Union (EU) members to increase their pressure on Israel and impose sanctions to force it to stop its “aggression” against the Palestinians, according to the report.

The resolution still needs to receive the approval of the municipality plenum.

Israel’s Embassy in Madrid condemned the resolution, reminding Pamplona that “The Kingdom of Navarre was the last of the peninsula to expel its Jews, and the Pamplona City Council the first to declare us persona non grata. Navarra 1498: Jews out – Pamplona 2018: We’re forbidden from entering.”

The Pamplona resolution is the latest anti-Israel initiatives in Spain.

Last week, the city of Oviedo canceled a concert of Israel’s NK Orchestra, citing political reasons. Oviedo also canceled an Israeli ballet performance.

Earlier this month, the municipality of Valencia approved a decision to declare itself as a place “clean from the Israeli apartheid” and will now boycott Israel culturally and economically.

Long list of BDS defeats in Spain

While the municipalities have passed anti-Israel resolutions, many of them are declared illegal and discriminatory by Spanish courts.

In March, a court in Las Palmas dealt another legal defeat to the anti-Israel BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) campaign when it nullified the boycott decision of the City Council of Telde, an Atlantic town of 100,000 residents in the east of the island of Gran Canary.

The Las Palmas decision closely preceded two other victories against the boycott campaign: a successful suit concerning the second boycott decision passed by the City Council of Castrillón, and a judgment issued against the boycott of the City Council of Montcada i Reixac.

These victories are part of an ongoing initiative to eliminate BDS from Spain, while Spanish Counsel for the Lawfare Project’s, Ignacio Wenley Palacios, has secured his 52nd legal victory.

The Lawfare Project is a legal think tank and litigation fund that files cases against anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli discrimination around the world.

Palacios, who led the case, said that “there is, in the law, a clear separation between politics and public office where the latter is not to be converted into an instrument at the service of the former. This is especially the case when — as here and with other city council boycotts — the objective is to exclude the adversary, in a clear abuse of power that aspires to place public offices at the service of political ideas that are discriminatory and contrary to the civil rights of every citizen, while simultaneously attempting to deprive others of their freedom to hold their own personal beliefs and opinions.”

Anti-BDS and Israel advocacy organizations have seen success after success in their legal battle against the anti-Israel elements.

In the last 12 months alone, the Lawfare Project has secured some 20 writs of injunction and favorable court decisions, establishing a Spanish legal doctrine against boycotts by transnational corporations purportedly instituted to comply with international law and human

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