Israel forbids Spain from accessing Palestinians following recognition of Palestinian statehood

Israel will stop the Spanish embassy from providing consular services to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Friday.

The move follows Spain's decision to recognise Palestine as a state earlier this week, and comments made by the country's deputy prime minister, who said "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free".

"Following Spain's recognition of a Palestinian state and the Spanish deputy prime minister's antisemitic call... I have decided to... prohibit the Spanish embassy from providing services to Palestinians from Judea and Samaria," the foreign minister wrote on Friday in a post on X, formerly Twitter, using the Biblical name for the occupied territory.

"If this ignorant, hate-filled individual wants to understand what radical Islam truly seeks, she should study the 700 years of Islamic rule in Al-Andalus – today's Spain," Katz added.