Vueling Affair: Ministers Benjamin Haddad and Aurore Bergé "firmly" condemn the remarks of the Spanish Minister of Transport

The controversy is growing. Two ministers in the Bayrou government "firmly" condemned on Wednesday, July 30, the remarks of the Spanish Minister of Transport, who had claimed that French Jewish teenagers who disembarked on July 23 from a plane operated by the Spanish company Vueling were "Israeli kids."

According to Benjamin Haddad, Minister for Europe, and Aurore Bergé, Minister for the Fight against Discrimination, this declaration equates "French children of Jewish faith with Israeli citizens, as if this in any way justified the treatment to which they were exposed," they declared.

According to several media outlets, Oscar Puente, the transport minister in Pedro Sanchez's left-wing government, published a post on X on Friday criticizing the right and accusing it of not defending the Spanish airline in favor of "teaming up with Israeli kids." He deleted his post the next day, according to the newspaper La Razón.

The ministers also denounced the actions of the Spanish police, accusing them of brutality against a child escort. "No action justifies the landing and the excessive and brutal use of force by the Guardia Civil against the young woman, who has just been given a 15-day temporary incapacity for work," they denounce.

The incident occurred on Wednesday afternoon, when the group, which had been in Spain for two weeks, was preparing to take off from Valencia airport (southeast) bound for Paris-Orly.

In statements on Thursday and Friday, the Spanish company, which has opened an internal investigation, blamed the incident on the teenagers, who were accused of "inappropriate behavior" and "a highly confrontational attitude, jeopardizing the smooth running of the flight."

Vueling said that "the group of teenagers were tampering with passenger safety equipment, posing a high risk to the aircraft, passengers and crew." They attempted, according to the company, "to take life jackets, tamper with the oxygen masks on the ceiling and remove the high-pressure oxygen cylinder," as well as disrupting the safety demonstration.

This "inappropriate behavior" continued "despite increasingly firm warnings from the crew ," to the point that "the captain was forced to request the intervention of the Civil Guard," Vueling explained. "We reiterate that the disembarkation of the passengers was done exclusively for security reasons," the airline stressed.

The Club Kineret association, which organised the camp, on the contrary claimed that the teenagers had been disembarked "without valid reason" and announced its intention to file a complaint against the carrier "for physical and psychological violence and discrimination on the basis of religion" .

The French ministers, who spoke with the escort on Wednesday, "noted that her testimony was confirmed by other passengers on board," they said. The company also said it had passenger testimonies that supported its version.