"It is absolutely unacceptable that those leaders who are incapable of fulfilling that duty [to make peoples' lives better] use the smoke of war to hide their failures and, in the process, line the pockets of a few -- the only ones who win when the world stops building hospitals to start making missiles."

"You can’t respond to one illegality with another because that’s how humanity’s great disasters begin."

"You can’t play Russian roulette with the destiny of millions … Nobody knows for sure what will happen now. Even the objectives of those who launched the first attack are unclear. But we must be prepared, as the proponents say, for the possibility that this will be a long war, with numerous casualties and, therefore, with serious economic consequences on a global scale."

"We are not going to be complicit in something that is bad for the world and is also contrary to our values and interests, just out of fear of reprisals from someone."

"MAGA-style leaders may say that our country can’t handle taking in so many migrants — that this is a suicidal move, the desperate act of a collapsing country. But don’t let them fool you. Spain is booming." 

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez 

President Donald Trump greets Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez during a summit to support ending the more than two-year Israel-Hamas war in Gaza after a breakthrough ceasefire deal, Monday, October 13, 2025, in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, Pool)

"Iran represents a miscalculation for Spain."

"The U.S. will find other ports or bases from which to launch its operations. Spain gains nothing from this equation and risks reinforcing its position as a political opponent at a particularly sensitive moment."

"Energy prices could ultimately derail the current government."

Joan Luis Manfredi, senior lecturer in foreign policy, University of Castilla-La Mancha 

 

"Sanchez has been the European leader who most consistently and publicly has pushed back against the things Trump has done that he doesn't like."

His public criticism is even more noticeable given the studied silence of most other European leaders."

Amanda Sloat, professor, IE University, Spain  

This would be the very same Spanish Prime Minister who has accused Israel of  'genocide' against the Palestinians in Gaza and succeeded in imposing an arms embargo on Israel. He also pronounced Spain's official recognition of a Palestinian state, along with France, the United Kingdom and Canada. That Hamas, the terrorist group governing Gaza precipitated the conflict in Gaza when it sent 6,000 of its operatives into southern Israel to embark on a orgy of rape, torture and slaughter is immaterial to this man who feels one 'illegality' does not justify another.

 

Politicians, he waxed sanctimonious, should be engaged in making lives bettee for people; the attack by the United States and Israel on Iran, in his opinion, was 'illegal' and unjustifiable. As the most senior socialist leader in the European Union, more radically left than even Britain's Keir Starmer, Sanchez stands alone in his outright denunciation of the President of the United States, eschewing diplomacy for the more direct route of full frontal accusation.

 

As a self-declared pacifist, it seems nothing -- no provocation, no empathy for a people suffering under the yoke of Islamofascism exercised by a theocratic government, nor outrage over the Islamic Republic's threats to annihilate a neighbouring country, much less sponsor a coterie of diehard Jew-hating jihadists to do its bidding through a Shi'ite 'ring of fire' surrounding Israel threatening its existence through violent 'resistance' to its presence on ancient Judean land -- could persuade him that pre-emptive existential action is ever warranted.

 

The malign international presence of a theocracy that worships a god that demands total submission in every facet of life, including dedication to jihad in the interests of global Islamic domination, and awaits the return of the 'hidden Mahdi' whose appearance will presage Armageddon and the ascent of all faithfully loyal Muslims to heaven, while the world is destroyed, believes that the return can be hastened by a man-made catastrophe of immense dimensions -- which the possession of nuclear devices could certainly assist in, fazes Sanchez not at all.

 

Spain has minimal direct trade exposure to the U.S. within the euro zone; below average for exporters in the euro zone, but its dependence on gas imports from the United States represents a trade Achilles heel, at a time when President Trump threatens to cut off trade with Spain. "We don't want anything to do with Spain", said the U.S. president, leaving the possibility of an halt to commerce through a blanket 'embargo'.  Spain is a liquefied natural gas hub for Europe with the US. accounting for 31 percent of its recent supply, rising to 44 percent in January.

 

Pedro Sánchez addressed the nation the morning after President Trump said he did not want 'anything to do' with Spain. La Moncloa Handout

"I believe our position is not naive at all."

"We will not be complicit in something that is bad for the world, and is contrary to our values and interests simply out of fear of reprisals from somebody."

"Spain’s position is the same as in Ukraine or Gaza. No to the breakdown of international law that protects us all. No to resolving conflicts with bombs. No to war."

"The world has been here before. Twenty-three years ago, another U.S. administration led us into an unjust war. The Iraq War led to a dramatic increase in terrorism and a serious migration and economic crisis. That was the gift of the ‘Azores Three’ (George W. Bush, Tony Blair and former Spanish prime minister José María Aznar) : a more insecure world and a worse life."

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez 

Yes, the world HAS been here before; in 1938 to be precise, when Britain's Prime Minister 

Neville Chamberlain following the Munich Agreement, arrived back home to triumphantly proclaim: "Peace for our time".