The judge of the investigating court 5 of Barcelona archived the complaint filed in mid-July against the former mayor Ada Colau and the former head of the Global Justice area for breaking Barcelona’s relationship with Israel and the twins in the city of Tel Aviv.
Collboni rebuilt the twin between Tel-Aviv and Barcelona
The pro-Israeli entity ACOM (Action and Communication on the Middle East) filed the complaint, considering that the decision, which has been revoked by the new mayor Collboni, constitutes a crime of hatred and repression.
But the magistrate did not agree. He argued that it could not be considered that the dissolution of Israel’s twin “could fall within the ‘clearly unreasonable’ resolution required by the criminal offense for the evaluation of the crime of prevarication,” as stated in the order, where elDiario has access .so.
The entity considered that the former mayor committed a crime of prevarication because Colau exceeded his power by making decisions that affect foreign policy, which corresponds to the central government.
But the truth is that the approved decree refers only to the Tel Aviv twins. What Colau did was accompany the decision with a letter to the Prime Minister of the country, Benyamin Netanyahu, in which he announced that he was “temporarily” suspending relations with the State of Israel “until the authorities put an end to the systematic violation of human rights.” to the Palestinian population.” According to the complainants, this letter has the status of an “administrative act.”
But the judge remembered that the law empowers a mayor to make decisions about twinning and considered that the council made the necessary procedures. Also, as the documents drawn up by the former mayor “clearly” refer to the relations between the Office of the Mayor and the authorities of the State of Israel, “the invasion of powers is not appreciated.”
Likewise, the judge did not think that Colau had committed a hate crime against Israel. The complainants, for their part, saw “all kinds of anti-Semitic inventions” in the letter sent by the former mayor to the Prime Minister of Israel, Benyamin Netanyahu.
In the letter, Colau refers to the “apartheid” experienced by the Palestinian population in Israel, but also makes a clear distinction between the State and “the Jewish population and its culture in general.”
So the judge did not see signs of hatred for anti-Semitic reasons and considered that, “whether or not it is politically expedient to inform the Israeli authorities of the opinion of the mayor of Barcelona on the actions of the Israeli authorities involved. in the conflict in Palestine. , such an action cannot be classified as a hate crime.”
The complaining entity, ACOM, is the only one that has gone to the controversial jurisdiction to request that the Mayor’s order suspending relations be suspended, but the initial judge rejected the precautionary request to paralyze the decision.
Likewise, the lawyer who filed the complaint, Francesc Jufresa, has complained against Colau in the past because of the pedestrianization of the city, which he also sees as criminal.
A unilateral decision
Colau’s decision to suspend the Tel Aviv twins was one of the most controversial of his last term as mayor. It was approved by the council of Barcelona en Comú through the decree of the Mayor’s Office on February 9 and thus ended the friendship agreement signed by former socialist mayor Joan Clos in 1998.
The commons support an initiative led by the platform Enough conspiracy with more than 4,000 signatures and the support of 80 entities, which asked to end that relationship as a sign of protest against the violation of human rights by the State of Israel among the Palestinian population.
But Colau met with rejection from his own government partner, the PSC, and from all other parties in the Municipal Plenary. Except for the ERC, which abstained, all others accused Colau of acting “unilaterally” and asked him to lift the suspension.
The former mayor remained in his position until he had to hand over the leadership to the socialist Jaume Collboni after the election. On September 1, the new mayor signed a decree that lifted Colau’s suspension and in which Barcelona once again had a three-way twinning with Tel Aviv and Gaza.
