Tusk says Israel puts Poland's solidarity to hard test
Poland’s prime minister has said statements by Israel's prime minister and ambassador in the wake of an Israeli strike on a Gaza aid convoy which killed a Pole are putting Poland's solidarity to "a really hard test."
World Central Kitchen (WCK), a US-based humanitarian organisation operating in the Gaza Strip, reported on Tuesday that seven members of its team, including one from Poland, died in an Israeli strike on their vehicles on Monday.
Following the report, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu admitted a "tragic case of an unintentional strike" by Israeli forces on "innocent people."
Later on Tuesday, Israeli ambassador to Poland Yacov Livne took to the X platform to write: "The extreme right and left in Poland accuse Israel of intentional murder in yesterday's attack, which resulted in the death of members of a humanitarian organization, including a Polish citizen.
"Deputy Speaker of the Sejm (lower house - PAP) and leader of the Confederation (far right party - PAP), Krzysztof Bosak, claims that Israel is committing "war crimes" and terrorising humanitarian organisations to starve the Palestinians.
“This is the same Bosak who to this day has refused to condemn the massacre committed by Hamas on October 7 and whose party colleague, a right-wing extremist, used a fire extinguisher to extinguish the Hanukkah menorah that we lit in the parliament in Warsaw.
“Conclusion: anti-Semites will always remain anti-Semites, and Israel will remain a democratic Jewish State that fights for its right to exist. Also for the good of the entire Western world," the post further read.
On Wednesday, Polish prime minister Donald Tusk posted on the X platform: "Mr. Prime Minister Netanyahu, Mr. Ambassador Livne, the vast majority of Poles showed full solidarity with Israel after the Hamas attack.
“Today you are putting this solidarity to a really hard test. The tragic attack on volunteers and your reaction arouse understandable anger," he wrote. (PAP)
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