Norway shutters Palestinian office after Israel revokes diplomats’ accreditation
Norwegian foreign minister decries Israeli government’s ‘extreme and unreasonable’ decision, vows Oslo will continue working for ‘viable Palestinian state’ despite setbacks
Norway will be closing its Representative Office in the Palestinian West Bank town of Al-Ram “until further notice,” Oslo’s foreign minister said on Friday, following a decision by Israel to revoke the accreditation of Norwegian diplomats working there.
Earlier this month, Israel’s Foreign Ministry announced that it would be revoking the diplomatic status of eight Norwegian diplomats who dealt with the Palestinian Authority, in response to Oslo’s recognition of a Palestinian state earlier this year.
The dramatic step would serve to show the Norwegians that there was “a price for anti-Israel conduct,” Foreign Minister Israel Katz said at the time.
The diplomats were told that they would have their accreditation revoked within a week and their visas in three months. They were all offered the option to apply for new accreditation.
In a statement on Friday, Norwegian Foreign Ministry Espen Barth Eide said that Oslo considered the decision by the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be “extreme and unreasonable.”
The decision sought to target “the Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority and all those who defend international law, the two-state solution and the Palestinians’ legitimate right to self-determination,” Barth Eide said, vowing that Oslo would not allow the closure to impact its work “for a viable Palestinian state.”
The European Union, the United Kingdom and the United States have all criticized the revocation and noted the role Norway has played in the Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts over the last three decades.
Norway facilitated the secret talks between Israel and the Palestinians that led to the 1993 Oslo Accords and chairs the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee, which coordinates development assistance to the Palestinians.
In light of the closure of the West Bank Representative Office, nearly 30 years after it opened in 1995, Barth Eide said Norway was “working to determine” the best way to move forward.
Oslo would “continue our active work to achieve a sustainable two-state solution, which we believe is in the best interests of the security of both Israelis and Palestinians and for the other countries in the Middle East,” he added.
Appearing to respond to Katz’s accusation that instead Norway had “chosen to award the murderers and rapists of Hamas” in the aftermath of the October 7 terror onslaught in southern Israel, Barth Eide said that Norway “is a friend of Israel and the Israeli people.”
“We have strongly condemned Hamas’ terrorist attack against Israel on October 7 last year,” he said. “We have been clear that the hostages must be released immediately and that a ceasefire is more urgent than ever.”
Norway, along with Spain and Ireland, formally recognized a Palestinian state in late May, in a move that Barth Eide said constituted “a milestone in the relationship between Norway and Palestine.
Throughout the war in Gaza, Norway has been critical of Israel’s conduct, while affirming its right to self-defense against the Hamas terror group.
It voted in favor of the October 27 United Nations resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza — alongside the release of Hamas-held hostages — before Israel’s ground offensive even began.
The war erupted with the October 7 invasion of southern Israel, in which thousands of Hamas-led terrorists slaughtered some 1,200 people — most of them civilians — and seized 251 hostages, of whom 111 are still believed to be held in Gaza.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
