Feijóo, trapped between Trump and the Pope

MadridFiercely defending Spain's traditional alliances while the military and verbal escalation of Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu increases puts the PP in a complicated situation. Alberto Núñez Feijóo has so far avoided clashing with the United States and Israel even when they have attacked one of the pillars of Spanish conservatives, such as Catholicism. The popular party stood aside when the Israeli government vetoed Palm Sunday mass in the Holy Land, and now that the US president has put Pope Leo XIV in his sights, Feijóo has been caught between the two.

It is true that, unlike the silence maintained when Israel prevents the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem from reaching the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre, on this occasion the popular leader has spoken out about the controversy, but has done so with an indirect criticism without directly mentioning Trump. "Christianity is an ethical and moral beacon for millions of people in the world, which does not deserve to be trifled with," Feijóo wrote on X this Monday after the confrontation between the Pope and the President of the USA over the former's condemnation of the war in Iran. Vox, which did not comment yesterday, admitted this Tuesday that Trump "went too far" when he tried to be "funny". Despite the dispute between the two formations for the Catholic electorate, Santiago Abascal's party does not see eye to eye with Leo XIV, and instead, they are Trump's reference allies in Spain.

Feijóo's mention of the "joke" can also be interpreted as an implicit rejection of the image of the US president generated with artificial intelligence in which he appears as if he were a God healing a sick man. "Pope Leo XIV is a reference for Catholics who must be heard and respected," Feijóo insisted in a message defending the leader of the Catholic Church without the forcefulness that has characterized Pedro Sánchez when he has rejected Trump's statements or decisions. The PP's line is to avoid confrontation by opting for lukewarmness.

Cryptic messages

Thus, the popular strategy is to try to mark its own profile, but without bothering its Western allies in the United States and Israel. Feijóo has deployed this plan with cryptic messages. The leader of the Spanish opposition, faced with the unfulfilled threat of the annihilation of Iranian civilization that Trump made last week, reacted this way on X: "In delicate moments, we need common sense, not brutality. The West is not that." In this way, the popular leader did not directly mention either the US president or his challenge to the Iranian regime.

Ester Muñoz, spokesperson for the PP in Congress, also added that the threat was a "barbarity", but at the same time generated a strong controversy by downplaying the detention by Israel of a Spanish soldier who is a UN blue helmet. "I have been in transit controls that have kept me detained for much longer," she said, given that the situation lasted an hour.

The policy of alliances

The PP intends to discredit Sanchez for the role he has adopted internationally as an antithesis to Trump and Netanyahu. According to the Popular Party, it is an act of irresponsibility that reveals him as just another populist. This is the framework he has tried to establish following the electoral defeat of the Hungarian Viktor Orbán. The PP has labeled Sanchez "the Orbán of the south" and has predicted that he will be the next to fall from government due to the rise of conservatives. "Orbán pro-Putin and Sanchez pro-China. The first has fallen, and now we are going for the second," said deputy secretary Alma Ezcurra this Monday, who attributed the Spanish president's official trip to China to an anti-democratic and anti-Western turn by Sanchez. However, the PSOE sees it as a lesson to the PP in the State, which is making pacts with Vox, as Abascal's party is from the same political family as Orbán: the socialists have celebrated the victory of Péter Magyar as if it were from the progressive sphere. For Pedro Sanchez's party, it is a triumph of democracy.