Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely hailed the vote by the Swiss parliament of an unprecedented motion which prohibits government funding of the anti-Israel BDS movement.

"I congratulate the Swiss parliament for this important step towards justice and human morals. This decision deserves to be adapted in other parliaments across Europe. We are all in favor of human rights, but there are organizations that serve a different purpose under the guise of this notion, and it's crucial to make efforts to uncover their true goals," she said.

The National Council in Switzerland– which is the lower chamber of the country’s parliament – passed a motion to prevent the state from "financing any organization which supports racism, anti-Semitism, or the BDS." BDS is the anti-Israel Boycott,Divestment, Sanctions movement.

The approved motion will be submitted in May to the Council of States, the upper chamber of the parliament, which will decide whether it becomes law.

The vote, 111 in favor of the motion against 78 and 4 abstentions, marks the first time any European parliament acknowledges moral equivalence or correlation between anti-Semitism and the BDS movement, despite the opposition of Swiss Foreign Minister Dirk Burkhalter, who encouraged the parliament to reject the motion, claiming that "it is Switzerland's right to encourage public discussion in Israel."