Israel's far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has attacked EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, saying he “sided with the terrorists,” after criticizing statements by him and another minister that they considered inciting war crimes in Gaza.
“The day will come when Europe will be ashamed of Borrell who sided with the real terrorists,” Smotrich wrote on his X account, responding in turn to yesterday's message from the high representative of the European Union.
“This war requires choosing between good and evil, and it is clear that Borrell has chosen the wrong side of history,” Smotrich said. He also criticized him for calling the Israeli bombing of Gaza “worse” than that of Nazi Germany, and for using the suffering of the Palestinian people “only to be able to attack Israel.”
“If Borrell really cared about the Palestinians, he would oppose the wall that Egypt is building to surround Gaza and imprison Gazans. “This would help Gazans who are trying to escape Hamas' brutality and start a new, safe life within the EU,” the minister said.
Smotrich is unhappy with what Borrell wrote yesterday on his “As the world pushes for a ceasefire in Gaza, Minister Gvir calls for cuts in fuel and aid to civilians. “This is incitement to war crimes,” Borrell said, and urged the Israeli government to “unequivocally distance itself from these incitements to commit war crimes.”
Borrell had already criticized the Finance Minister's statements in which he considered it “justified and moral” to let the two million inhabitants of Gaza die of hunger and thirst in order to obtain the release of a hundred Israeli hostages still held by Palestinian militiamen. The far-right executive of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to make concessions to reach an agreement with the Islamist group Hamas that would allow the release of the kidnapped people and a ceasefire in the Palestinian enclave, where some 40,000 people have died – the majority of them minors and women.
The head of European diplomacy has repeatedly called for a truce between Israel and Hamas to end more than ten months of conflict, and he again asked Israel yesterday to act in “good faith” in the negotiations planned for this week with mediators from the United States, Qatar and Egypt.