Foreign Minister Eli Cohen
Foreign Minister Eli CohenNaama Stern

Foreign Minister Eli Cohen on Friday ordered that the Belgian and Spanish ambassadors to Israel be summoned for reprimands.

The order came after Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez held a press conference at the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt, just before Hamas was due to free the first batch of hostages it has been holding since October 7.

In that press conference, the Prime Minister of Belgium called to make the temporary ceasefire between Hamas and Israel a permanent one.

The Prime Minister of Spain said that he spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the fact that the time has come to stop the cycle of violence in the region and promote peace. He also claimed that "Israel is violating international law and is carrying out indiscriminate killings in Gaza."

"We condemn the false claims of the Prime Ministers of Spain and Belgium who are giving a tailwind to terrorism," Foreign Minister Cohen said in a statement later on Friday.

"Israel is acting in accordance with international law and fighting a murderous terrorist organization worse than ISIS that commits war crimes and crimes against humanity," he added.

"We will resume fighting after the ceasefire until the elimination of Hamas' rule in the Gaza Strip and the release of all the hostages," concluded Cohen.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he “strongly condemns the comments by the prime ministers of Belgium and Spain, who did not place total responsibility on Hamas for the crimes against humanity it perpetrated: massacring Israeli citizens and using Palestinians as human shields.”

(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)