JERUASALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called his Belgian counterpart a “weak leader” on Wednesday, slamming his decision to recognize Palestine as a state.
“Belgian Prime Minister (Bart) de Wever is a weak leader who seeks to appease Islamic terrorism by sacrificing Israel. He wants to feed the terrorist crocodile before it devours Belgium,” Netanyahu’s office said in a post on its official X account.
Belgium on Tuesday became the latest Western country to say it will recognize the State of Palestine at the UN General Assembly this month, following similar announcements by Australia, Canada and France.
In a post on X, Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said that the decision came “in view of the humanitarian tragedy” unfolding in Gaza, adding that “firm sanctions are being imposed against the Israeli government.”
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called Wednesday for the annexation of swathes of the occupied West Bank following the international moves to recognize a Palestinian state.
Despite mounting pressure at home and abroad to end its nearly two-year campaign in Gaza, Israel has recently been stepping up operations as it lays the groundwork for seizing Gaza City, where the UN has declared a famine.
The war was sparked by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 63,746 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.
Netanyahu slams Belgium PM as ‘weak’ after move to recognize Palestinian state
https://arab.news/22gtk
Netanyahu slams Belgium PM as ‘weak’ after move to recognize Palestinian state
- Benjamin Netanyahu: ‘Belgian PM (Bart) de Wever is a weak leader who seeks to appease Islamic terrorism by sacrificing Israel’
- Netanyahu: ‘He wants to feed the terrorist crocodile before it devours Belgium’
Australia hits Afghan Taliban officials with sanctions, travel bans
- The Taliban has said it respects women’s rights, in line with its interpretation of Islamic law and local custom
- The measures were part of a new Australian government framework that enabled it to “directly impose its own sanctions and travel bans to increase pressure on the Taliban, targeting the oppression of the Afghan people,” Wong said
SYDNEY: Australia on Saturday imposed financial sanctions and travel bans on four officials in Afghanistan’s Taliban government over what it said was a deteriorating human rights situation in the country, especially for women and girls.
Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong said the officials were involved “in the oppression of women and girls and in undermining good governance or the rule of law” in the Taliban-run country.
Australia was one of several nations which in August 2021 pulled troops out of Afghanistan, after being part of a NATO-led international force that trained Afghan security forces and fought the Taliban for two decades after Western-backed forces ousted the Islamist militants from power.
The Taliban, since regaining power in Afghanistan, has been criticized for deeply restricting the rights and freedoms of women and girls through bans on education and work.
The Taliban has said it respects women’s rights, in line with its interpretation of Islamic law and local custom.
Wong said in a statement the sanctions targeted three Taliban ministers and the group’s chief justice, accusing them of restricting access for girls and women “to education, employment, freedom of movement and the ability to participate in public life.”
The measures were part of a new Australian government framework that enabled it to “directly impose its own sanctions and travel bans to increase pressure on the Taliban, targeting the oppression of the Afghan people,” Wong said.
Australia took in thousands of evacuees, mostly women and children, from Afghanistan after the Taliban retook power in the war-shattered South Asian country, where much of the population now relies on humanitarian aid to survive.
