<\/p>\nListen to this article<\/span>\u00a0|\u00a0<\/span>5 mins<\/span><\/p>\n<\/button>info<\/title><path class=\"icon-main-color\" d=\"M12 0a12 12 0 1 0 0 24 12 12 0 0 0 0-24Zm-.226 3.225a2.039 2.039 0 0 1 2.155 1.924v.193a1.998 1.998 0 0 1-2.155 2.149 2.029 2.029 0 0 1-2.146-2.15 2.039 2.039 0 0 1 1.955-2.122h.193l-.002.006Zm3.227 15.525a.75.75 0 0 1-.752.75H9.75a.75.75 0 0 1-.75-.75v-1.5a.75.75 0 0 1 .752-.75h.748V12h-.75a.75.75 0 0 1-.75-.75v-1.5a.75.75 0 0 1 .752-.751h3a.75.75 0 0 1 .75.752v6.75h.75a.75.75 0 0 1 .75.749L15 18.75Z\"\/><\/svg><\/button><\/div>\n<div aria-live=\"polite\" aria-atomic=\"true\">\n<p><strong>Madrid, Spain \u2013<\/strong> Spain has pledged to keep opposing the war waged by the United States and Israel on Iran after President Donald Trump said Washington would cut off all commercial links with Madrid.<\/p>\n<p>Trump\u2019s rebuke on Tuesday came after Washington\u2019s European ally refused to let the US military use its bases for missions linked to strikes on Iran.<\/p>\n<section class=\"more-on\">\n<h2 class=\"more-on__heading\">Recommended Stories<!-- --> <\/h2>\n<p><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">list of 4 items<\/span><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">end of list<\/span><\/section>\n<p>\u201cSpain has been terrible,\u201d the president told reporters on Tuesday during a meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, adding, \u201cWe\u2019re going to cut off all trade with Spain. We don\u2019t want anything to do with Spain.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, one of the few left-wing leaders in Europe to condemn the US-Israel attack on Iran as \u201cunjustifiable\u201d and \u201cdangerous\u201d, said in a televised nationwide address on Wednesday that Spain\u2019s position was \u201cno to the war\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is how humanity\u2019s great disasters start \u2026 The world cannot solve its problems with conflicts and bombs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>His position cements Spain\u2019s status as an outlier in Europe; Madrid has been one of the few European nations to consistently condemn Israel\u2019s genocidal war on Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>At the Patron Bar in Malasana, Madrid, Gema Tamarit watched Sanchez\u2019s address on the television in the restaurant, which turned up the volume.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat Trump is mad. We are not afraid of him. Good for Sanchez for sticking up to him. Some more leaders in Europe should do the same,\u201d said Tamarit, 53, a software engineer. \u201cOf course, Iran is an awful regime, but is this the way to change things, by going to war like this?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A series of opinion polls suggests that more than half of Spaniards oppose Trump\u2019s foreign policy.<\/p>\n<p>According to a poll published by Eurobazuka in February, 53 percent said they opposed the US president\u2019s policies, the third highest group by nationality after the French and Belgians, with 57 percent and 62 percent, respectively.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\">In another poll published in January, nearly 60 percent of Spaniards said they disagreed with the US president\u2019s operation to arrest the former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, according to a survey published by GESOP for Prensa Iberica media group.<\/p>\n<p>The Eurobazuka poll said 48 percent of Europeans considered Trump to be \u201can enemy of Europe\u201d, compared with 10 percent who believed he was an ally.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"trump-s-trade-threat\">Trump\u2019s trade threat<\/h2>\n<p>Analysts said the US may not be able to inflict much commercial damage on Spain, as it is part of the European Union.<\/p>\n<p>Last month, the US Supreme Court declared Trump\u2019s threat to impose a range of tariffs worldwide as illegal.<\/p>\n<p>Victor Burguete, an expert in trade and economics at the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs think tank, said the only way Trump could act against Spain would be to prove the US faced a situation of national emergency.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is not likely that he can prove acting against Spain is a national emergency,\u201d he told Al Jazeera. \u201cI think this is more a threat than a real possibility of ending trade with Spain.<\/p>\n<p>The dispute erupted when the US relocated 15 aircraft, including refuelling tankers, from the Rota and Moron military bases in southern Spain on Monday after the country\u2019s socialist government said it would not allow them to be used to attack Iran.<\/p>\n<p>Trump has also referred to Spain\u2019s refusal to raise spending on NATO from 2 to 5 percent of gross domestic product, saying \u201cSpain has absolutely nothing that we need.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sanchez has provoked Trump\u2019s anger with policies including refusing to let vessels transporting weapons to Israel dock in Spain and condemning Israel\u2019s genocide in Gaza. Spain was among the first European nations to recognise a State of Palestine in 2024, along with Ireland, Slovenia and Norway.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTrump is just angry because Spain has refused to raise NATO spending and condemned the technology companies connected with social media. And done this publicly,\u201d said Burguete.<\/p>\n<p>Spain last month announced it was considering banning children under 16 from accessing social media, and was studying legal action against Grok, Instagram and TikTok.<\/p>\n<p>Bruguete said he believed Sanchez took this stance against the war because he opposed the \u201cstrongman politics\u201d of Trump, but also because it played well domestically before the general elections next year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is no doubt that the foreign policy of Trump is not popular in Spain,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Spain is the world\u2019s top exporter of olive oil and sells auto parts, steel and chemicals to the US, but is less vulnerable to Trump\u2019s threats of economic punishment than other European nations.<\/p>\n<p>The US had a trade surplus with Spain for the fourth year in a row in 2025, at $4.8bn, according to US Census Bureau Data, with US exports of $26.1bn and imports of $21.3bn.<\/p>\n<p>The EU said on Wednesday it expected the US to abide by a trade deal with the EU, was \u201cready to act\u201d to safeguard its interests, and stood in \u201cfull solidarity\u201d with member states, but did not name Spain.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Listen to this article\u00a0|\u00a05 mins info Madrid, Spain \u2013 Spain has pledged to keep opposing the war waged by the United States and Israel on Iran after President Donald Trump said Washington would cut off all commercial links with Madrid. Trump\u2019s rebuke on Tuesday came after Washington\u2019s European ally refused to let the US military […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13877,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}