Spanish High Court condemns the boycott against Israel in Cordoba

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  • The Higher Court of Justice of Andalusia has rejected the appeal against the sentence that annuls the boycott against Israel.
  • The ruling of the Higher Court of Justice of Andalusia completely rejects the appeal presented by the Provincial Council of Cordoba against the sentence that declared illegal the adherence of institution, with the votes of PSOE and IU, to the BDS campaign (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) against Israel. The Higher Court of Justice of Andalusia also sentences the City Hall to pay the costs of the legal process.
  • ACOM sees reaffirmed its legal initiative against the BDS discriminatory movement that intends to use the Spanish public institutions to discriminate against the Jewish people and all who relate with it.
  • This is the tenth decision emitted by a Spanish Higher Court of Justice confirming prior sentences against BDS following the legal initiative of ACOM.

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On 17 february 2016 the Provincial Council of Cordoba (population 785,000 in southern of Spain) declared said council as ELAI “Space Free of Israeli Apartheid”. The motion was approved with the votes in favour of PSOE (Socialist Party) and Izquierda Unida (Communist Party), and the vote against of Partido Popular (centre-right party). The Psoe is the ruling party in Spain, and IU, its partner in government.

The cultural association Asociación Andalucía-Israel presented a contentious-administrative appeal against said measure, which included said city and its population in a clear discriminatory practice by adhering to the BDS-ELAI space. Later, the Contentious Administrative Court number 2 of Cordoba, in sentence number 21/2021, conclusively annulled that measure, indicating that the agreement “was a violation of the competences that the city hall has, becoming involved in international relations, and only for this reason said resolution must be declared null and void”.

But the City Hall of Provincial Council of Cordoba, not satisfied with its original discriminatory and fraudulent decision, presented an appeal against that sentence. The response of the Higher Court of Justice of Andalusia, in sentence 163/22 and dated on 2 february, 2022, could not be more demolishing: complete rejection of the appeal.

Based on numerous examples of recent jurisprudence, in its sentence the Higher Court of Justice of Andalusia meticulously dismantles the aspiration of the Provincial Council, expressly pointing out that “identifying the City Hall with said position, far from obeying the rule of law, is in open contradiction with the Constitution, and said decision is outside of the municipal competences”.

The Higher Court of Justice of Andalusia also condemns the Council to pay for the costs incurred in by this second instance, according to article 139.2 of the Administrative Procedure Act, and given the rejection of the appeal.

Thanks to the legal initiative of ACOM, the main denouncer of the discourse of hatred and/or the discrimination for ethnic or national reasons that this movement promotes, 83 agreements have been annulled to date; ten of them corroborated by Higher Courts of Justice throughout the whole country. All the sentences have insisted in the anti-constitutional and illegal nature of these excluding measures that violate the common framework of coexistence.