Swiss foreign minister says Israel’s reaction should be ‘proportionate’
Palestinians flee from northern Gaza to the south on Friday after the Israeli army issued an unprecedented evacuation warning to a population of over one million people
Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Swiss Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis said on Friday that Israel had the right to defend itself following a deadly attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas but said its response should be “proportionate”.
This content was published on
2 minutes
Reuters
العربية
ar
وزير الخارجية السويسري: يجب أن يكون ردُّ الفعل الإسرائيلي “متناسبًا”
“What we are doing is calling for international humanitarian law to be respected while recognising Israel’s legitimate right to defence,” Cassis told a news briefing in response to a question about a possible ground invasion of the Gaza strip.
“They need to find a proportionate response,” he said.
Cassis opened the briefing by announcing the death of a Swiss dual national aged nearly 70 in the violence. He did not give details beyond saying the individual was killed by “terrorists”.
Switzerland, which sometimes acts as a neutral intermediary between parties to a conflict, does not have any contact with Hamas, he said. “It is not the time now for good offices. It is now a time of war,” he said.
He added that the Swiss government views Hamas as a “terrorist organisation”. It is currently exploring whether and how to make that legally binding, possibly by banning the group.
This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. You can find them here.
If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.
External Content
Your subscription could not be saved. Please try again.
Almost finished… We need to confirm your email address. To complete the subscription process, please click the link in the email we just sent you.
Most Read Swiss Abroad
More
The citizenship obstacle course facing spouses of Swiss Abroad
Swiss institute hosted informal talks between Russians, Ukrainians and Americans
This content was published on
The Geneva Center for Security Policy (GCSP) has hosted 10 meetings between Russian and Ukrainian interlocutors since the start of the war.
Automated driving on Swiss motorways is theoretically possible from March
This content was published on
It will be theoretically possible to hand over the steering wheel to technology but no such system has been submitted for official approval yet.
Heated atmosphere at Swiss rally against AfD politician Alice Weidel
This content was published on
Around 250 people demonstrated "against the right" and the German AfD politician Alice Weidel on Saturday afternoon in Einsiedeln.
This content was published on
The Ethos Foundation recommends that shareholders vote against all compensation-related items at the Annual General Meeting on March 7.
Top Swiss firms close to reaching gender quota in boards
This content was published on
The proportion of women on the boards of directors of the fifty largest listed companies in Switzerland currently stands at 28%.
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.