A Danish-flagged ship that the El Pais newspaper claims is transporting 27 tons of explosive material from Chennai, India, to the port of Haifa, Israel, is denied docking in Madrid.
According to Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares, Spain has denied permission for a ship transporting weapons to Israel to anchor in a Spanish port. The ship may have avoided entering Israel through the Red Sea, where the Houthis of Yemen maintain control, because it is allegedly loaded with 27 tonnes of explosive material from India.
Albares told reporters in Brussels on Thursday, “This is the first time we have done this because it is the first time we have detected a ship carrying a shipment of arms to Israel that wants to call at a Spanish port.”
“This will be a consistent policy for any ship that wishes to call at Spanish ports while transporting weapons to Israel. For one clear reason, the foreign ministry will consistently turn down such stopovers. The Middle East needs more peace, not more armaments,” he continued.
The Spanish minister withheld information about the ship, but Oscar Puente, the minister of transportation, revealed that it was the Marianne Danica that had asked to make a port call at Cartagena, in the southeast of the country, on May 21.
Israel-Indian arms ties
The Danish-flagged ship is reportedly transporting 27 tons of explosive material from Madras, India, to the port of Haifa, Israel, according to the El Pais newspaper.
India is the country that purchases the most Israeli armaments, some of which are stationed in disputed Kashmir and in unstable areas of eastern and central India.
India is said to have imported $2.9 billion worth of military hardware from Israel during the previous ten years. Radars, missiles, combat drones, and other monitoring equipment are among the items sold. Although Israel and India restored diplomatic relations in 1992, Tel Aviv has been supplying New Delhi with weapons since the 1960s.
India benefited from Israeli weaponry in its conflicts with Pakistan and China. In 2018, Elbit Systems, a prominent military enterprise in Israel, collaborated with the Indian conglomerate Adani Group to produce Hermes 900 drones at a southern Indian plant. These drones are subsequently transported to Israel for Israeli purposes.
India is said to have sent some of these deadly drones to Israel as part of Israel’s continuing invasion of Gaza.
The word that permission had been refused coincides with a dispute over another ship, the Borkum, scheduled to arrive in Cartagena on Friday, between the hard-left Sumar party and the Socialists of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s coalition.
Sumar has demanded that the Borkum be turned away because pro-Palestine parties claim it is bringing weapons to Israel. However, according to Puente, the Borkum was carrying military supplies to the Czech Republic rather than Israel.
Spain is attempting to get other European capitals to support the concept of recognizing a Palestinian state, having been one of the most vocal opponents of Israel’s Gaza offensive in Europe. After Israel began launching a military assault against besieged Gaza, Spain stopped selling armaments to that country.
war of genocide
The Palestinian resistance group Hamas claims that their surprise attack on Israel on October 7 was planned in response to Israeli attacks on the Al Aqsa Mosque, violence by illegal settlers in the occupied West Bank, and a desire to get the Palestine subject “back on the table.”
Hamas fighters launched an astonishingly wide-ranging attack, encroaching on up to 22 non-Gaza areas, including towns and other settlements up to 24 kilometers away from the border.
According to other accounts, they shot numerous troops dead while Israel’s military struggled to organize a defense. They also brought over 240 hostages, including both Israeli military personnel and civilians, with them when they returned to Gaza.
Afterwards, many of the prisoners were traded for Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli prisons.
Since then, Israel has relentlessly bombed Gaza from the air, land, and sea, murdering over 35,000 Palestinians—mostly women and children—injuring up to 80,000 more, and forcing the majority of the 2.4 million residents of the small coastal enclave to flee their homes.
The International Court of Justice has accused Israel of genocide and directed Tel Aviv to take steps to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches the enclave’s civilian population and that its soldiers do not commit acts of genocide.
SOURCE: TRTWORLD
