EU set to reassess ties if Israel doesn’t move on peace
Fed up with settlement expansion, officials in Brussels are working on punitive measures to be implemented as soon as the political leadership wants to do so
The European Union is inconspicuously but determinedly threatening to reevaluate bilateral ties with Israel if the Netanyahu government fails to make progress toward a two-state solution and continues its current policy of allowing construction beyond the pre-1967 lines.
The EU’s new policy has gone largely unnoticed due to this summer’s Operation Protective Edge, but EU officials are already busy at work on a set of sanctions against Israel that Brussels could enact whenever the union’s political echelon gives a green light. Indeed, some in the EU are currently considering implementing a mechanism that would immediately penalize Israel for every step deemed unhelpful to the peace process (such as settlement expansion), a senior European diplomat told The Times of Israel.
On July 22, in the middle of the 50-day war with Hamas, the 28 EU foreign ministers issued a joint statement that was widely seen as pro-Israel, as it condemned indiscriminate rocket fire against Israeli civilians and called for the disarmament of all terrorist organizations in Gaza. Even the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem praised the EU for the statement.
However, the text also severely criticized Israel, as the EU has in the past, for various policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians, including continued settlement expansion, “settler violence,” the “worsening of living conditions for Palestinians,” house demolitions, “evictions and forced transfers” and “increasing tensions” at the Temple Mount.
Critically, the joint statement went on to say that the future of bilateral ties is conditional on moves the EU deems helpful to achieve peace, marking the first time such a linkage was mentioned so explicitly.
“The EU underlines that the future development of the relations between the EU and both the Israeli and Palestinian partners will also depend on their engagement towards a lasting peace based on a two-state solution,” the joint statement stressed.
Last week, a spokesperson for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton used a similar formulation in a press release condemning Israel’s decision to advance construction in Jerusalem’s Givat Hamatos neighborhood and to allow Jews to move into houses in Silwan. Both areas are located beyond the pre-1967 lines.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with EU Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton, during their meeting in Jerusalem, on June 20, 2013. (photo credit: Amos Ben Gershom/ GPO/Flash90)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, left, with EU Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton in Jerusalem, June 20, 2013. (photo credit: Amos Ben Gershom/ GPO/Flash90)
“We stress that the future development of relations between the EU and Israel will depend on the latter’s engagement towards a lasting peace based on a two-state solution,” the recent statement read.
The juxtaposition of Israel’s ties with the EU and Jerusalem’s will to establish a Palestinian state sounded like a threat to some.
“Some analysts saw it as a sign of impending action,” noted Andrew Rettman of EUObserver.com, a journalistic website run by a Brussels-based nonprofit. The Qatar-based Gulf Times newspaper understood the EU’s statement to mean that Israel’s plans in East Jerusalem “pose a threat to … Israel’s relations with the European Union.”
For the time being, it should be stressed, the EU has no intention of cutting ties with Israel, nor does it intended to enact very harsh sanctions right away. However, there is little doubt that the union and its 28 member states are becoming increasingly fed up with issuing condemnations whenever Jerusalem announces new plans for construction in East Jerusalem or the West Bank, without being able to do anything about it.
Therefore, EU officials have started working on mechanisms to impose penalties on Israel, the senior European diplomat told The Times of Israel. The plan under consideration is to respond to every Israeli action deemed detrimental to the peace process by implementing a step that would hurt Israel, the diplomat elaborated.
How would this work? The EU has long insisted that existing EU legislation needs to be implemented, which in many cases is not yet the case. If Jerusalem were to approve another building project in East Jerusalem, for example, the union could opt to introduce a labeling regime for products from West Bank settlements.
Brussels argues that EU law requires such labeling, but the EU has hitherto refrained from implementing a labeling regime, partly so as not to disturb US-brokered peace negotiations with the Palestinians. But now that the talks have broken down, and Israel continues to build beyond the Green Line, there is very little that would hold the EU back from requiring such labels on all settlement goods imported to Europe, the diplomat indicated.
While concrete sanctions might not be announced at the meeting of the EU’s foreign ministers on October 20 in Luxembourg, the details of possible punitive measures (such as labeling) are currently being discussed in several working-level meetings in Brussels, the diplomat said. Once the bureaucratic work is completed, the union’s political leaders could implement such measures at a time of their choosing.
The EU is not only brandishing the stick; it is also offering carrots. Were Israelis and Palestinians to make peace, the EU has promised to grant both parties a “Special Privileged Partnership” — a significant upgrade in ties that would include financial, political and security assistance.
“The EU is slowly emerging as a political player in the world. It is increasingly linking its economic power to specific policies,” said Caspar Veldkamp, the Netherlands’ ambassador to Israel. “Regarding Israel, the EU offered the prospect of a special partnership, akin to Switzerland’s relations with the EU, in the event of a final status agreement. At the same time, if Israel continues to announce building decisions and so on, a tendency will grow in the EU to respond to such Israeli steps by implementing specific EU measures.”
Several of these measures were already decided upon by the EU’s foreign ministers in 2012, the ambassador said.
Ambassador for the Netherlands to Israel Caspar Veldkamp, June 10, Amsterdam. (photo credit: Bibi Neury, Photo Republic)
Ambassador Caspar Veldkamp (photo credit: Bibi Neury, Photo Republic)
Veldkamp diagnosed an “erosion of support for Israel in European countries” due to a lack of progress in the peace process. “I am fully aware that you need two parties to make progress. But Europeans expect more initiative from the Israeli side, since they see Israel as the stronger party of the two,” he said. “Moreover, Europeans are increasingly annoyed with Israel’s continuing decisions on building across the Green Line.”
Some smaller member states have already indicated their desire to sanction Israel if the peace process doesn’t advance to their liking.
Last month, Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja warned Jerusalem that trade and other relations might suffer if the peace process doesn’t advance at a satisfactory pace. The EU has offered enough carrots, he told Haaretz, adding that “it also seems that it needs the possibility of sticks. If there is no progress, [Israel] has to be shown that there are costs involved in the stalling,” he said.
A few days later, the foreign minister of Denmark, Martin Lidegaard, similarly threatened “new steps, including a change in our trade relations with Israel,” in case the ceasefire negotiations with Hamas in Cairo didn’t go the way the Europeans expect. Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt later clarified that Lideggard’s statement reflected his private opinion and did not represent the government’s position. “I don’t think this will be discussed in the EU,” she said.
But if Jerusalem continues with its current policies towards Palestinians and settlements, it will be only a matter of time before the EU and its member states decide to reassess the future of bilateral relations with Israel, including the implementation of some type of sanctions.
@ yamit82:
I does my bestest.
@ honeybee:
I know and I ans it and pls reply asap. Important to me.
@ yamit82:
Samuel accepted my post.
@ honeybee:
Try another MT or any other and I will find it
@ yamit82:
I wrote a long two paragraphs to Mr Clemmons, but the site told my my session at run out and refused my post. Le haceme loca.
@ yamit82:
I have a very busy sched (mostly fun ;-)) for the next few days so I won’t be on Israpundit.
@ dove:
Have a great time Dove.
Tell us how it was when you can.
@ honeybee:
You know where to find me when you finish trimming!!!
I’ll be around.
Hice filetes de atún a la parrilla para la cena.
@ yamit82:
We are having celebrations here too.
@ dove:
Celebrations here about over and I can hardly walk no less dance. About an hour ago they paraded in front of my home… Lots of Joy and happiness. lots of noise too!!!
@ yamit82:
Oh, but I do. No mental clutter here.
Your smoke, which was intended to confuse me, has instead confused YOU. That’s what you’re ‘smelling.’
But then, that’s what you get for practicing diversionary tactics. “Voodoo,” indeed.
@ yamit82:
Aint it the truth.
@ yamit82:
Tonight is Simchat Torah!!!
@ dove:
Tonight is Simchat Torah!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JO4qWWR6jyM
@ dove:
dove Said:
Parashat Balak
The Gentile sees physical greatness and might, and measures his chances of success accordingly. Balak, for example, told Balaam, Now, come and curse for me this nation, for it is mightier than me (Numbers 22:6). The Jew, however, knows that he is the fewest of all the nations (Deuteronomy 7:7) – yet he is exalted above all those nations if he is faithful to G-d’s covenant: Five of you will pursue a hundred, and a hundred of you will pursue ten thousand (Leviticus 26:8).
Nonetheless, for those of no faith, or even of little faith, isolation is a frightening concept. Even observant and G-d fearing Jews are fearful of this concept. The person of weak faith longs for friends and allies, for help from strong nations against the surrounding dangers. Yet whoever relies on the non-Jew and his aid, and fears that without such aid the Jews and their land will be unable to survive, has been caught by lack of complete trust in G-d, bordering on denial of His existence. Is it possible that one who fears mortal man really believes in G-d?
dweller Said:
Think the stink is blowing my way————- you should practice proper hygiene.
@ M Devolin:
Hi Dev. That IS funny. Here in the diaspora if any Jew wants to know the E.U. has planned just go sit in a coffee shop for awhile and listen to their supporters. It is NO secret what they have planned.
“Why? — what did they have to do with the creation of those two things?”
That’s classified. LOL
@ yamit82:
I hear pain coming from you more than ‘disgust.’
You’ll have to explain that to my profs.
Too many in the family already.
(How many times can you hear the words, “An’ dis iz moy sunn, di dahkteh”… w/o dreaming of blue skies & tropical breezes?)
My ‘psychobabble’ is one HELLUVA lot more right-on, scientifically, than the overwhelming majority of headshrinkers
— who, as they deal almost exclusively w/ SYMPTOMS, have significantly more in common with witch doctors than I ever could.
When you have ACCESS to my knowledge base, you may be positioned to make such a statement.
— Until then, you’re just blowin’ smoke up my toochas.
dweller Said:
I didn’t say what the other times evoked and the thought of your touch is disgusting. Pre-med my ass!!! Your too stupid for that. It;s apparent you didn’t became an MD so you settled for witch doctor king of psychobabble. Voodoo is more appropriate to you knowledge base not science.
@ dweller:
OY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ yamit82:
Take it up with the high school teachers of my AP science courses; they & their letters of recommendation seem to disagree with you.
Couldn’t have succeeded as I did in pre-med if that were the case.
You haven’t refuted or even countered my original assertion, all you’ve done is condemned it. But then, that’s about your speed, isn’t it?
Oh? — when have I quoted them?
Only “sometimes”?
— I must be losing my touch.
@ honeybee:
Popular fantasy. Nothing glacial ever gouged anything with that kind of sharpness. This wasn’t a long, slow, protracted event.
Why? — what did they have to do with the creation of those two things?
dweller Said:
I don’t think you were a good student in high school science.
Seems you never progressed from that low point either.
Keep reading and quoting those loony christian creationists they are always good for chuckles and laughs as you are sometimes.
dweller Said:
Glacial Melt, Sweetie. Thank the Canadians for the Grand Canyon and the Mississippi River.
dweller Said:
Four corners: Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico. Where the Angels live because of the altitude and the dry atmosphere allow it to be easier to fly.
@ yamit82:
I go see the Doc. tomorrow. But Thanks anyway, today I the trim on my Angels dress.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
No idea what “angels at the four corners” is about. Think you’ve confused me with somebody else.
I’m happy with facts. But sometimes things are touted as ‘facts’ without their turning out to have been “such.” Sometimes things touted as ‘facts’ turn out to be only part fact, part fancy.
Happens all the time.
Nope. Concoctions never entered the picture for me.
Me too.
That’s why I believe in a global Flood powerful enough to have rearranged continents, created the Grand Canyon, shifted the poles of the planet, altered its magnetic field, and virtually pulverized most of the existing flesh (living and dead) that had existed until then.
@ yamit82:
The author of the linked article, Cristin Conger, apparently never bothered to read the Noah narrative, nor the fist chapter of Genesis, before asking her question. She can’t conceive of where all the extra water that would be needed to cover all the mountain tops could’ve come from.
I repeat:
Gen 7 says that “all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened…” [v. 11] The atmospheric canopy containing much of the planet’s moisture collapsed, adding a whole lot more water to the mix, at least until the event was over.
That upper expanse of water vapor had existed since before the creation of the earth:
1:6 And God said: ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.’
1:7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so.
Actually, you view “SHmuel’s friend” thru the prism of your own colossal confusion over the NT, grounded strictly in personal prejudices. Don’t see how PresentCompany, therefore, bereft as he is of so much as a shred of objectivity, could possibly get it right in the matter of whether “SHmuel’s friend” can or can’t get it right.
But this isn’t even about NT anyway.
It’s about doing your own thinking (what a concept!), and taking the scripture seriously enough to accept it on its own terms — instead of trying to read something into it in order to justify your own pre-set agenda.
@ dweller:
I do not intend to expand at all. That is all the time allocated to play with the angels at the four corners people. Facts are such. Take that or leave it. You are probably following Archbishop Ussher’s concoctions.
I look at the Majesty of Creation as it really was and continues.
End of thread.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
Actually it was NOT engineering data (forces, vectors, elements, materials, etc) that you offered in that post, Shmuel.
Rather, you offered anthropological, archeological, sociological data — and that doesn’t address the matters I raised. That’s why I said I found it harder to swallow those ‘findings’ than the notion that the Flood was insufficient in power to wipe out all that stuff.
Unless, of course, the Flood preceded all those other things. . . .
Either that, or there was no Flood.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
You keep saying that, and I’m assuming you had a point mind in making the remark.
But if you’re suggesting that dead bodies could’ve escaped utter destruction (virtual disintegration) from the sheer violence of the Event — merely because they weren’t being ‘punished’ — then I think that’s nutty.
Then again, perhaps the point you were making lay elsewhere.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
You subscribe to the notion of an old earth, yet you insist that the Flood itself goes back only 4300 years.
Trying to have it both ways?
@ honeybee:
Buenas noches mi hermosa abeja de la miel dulce, estoy chocando
Good luck tomorrow!!!!!
@ yamit82:
Supper time , talk tomorrow. I learned to love N.Mex it’s Indians and Spanish.
yamit82 Said:
I don’t like S.CA either. It’s cold and it’s damp.
@ honeybee:
I hated So ca. Went to school there and worked for CC making cans for Budweiser in Van Nyes…..Two day’s after I graduated quit my job and was on my way to Israel…6 day war had just started.
@ yamit82:
My Dad’s people lived in LA. I travelled 66 from the time I was small. Learning to love the Southwest.
I drove Route 66 when I was in high-school:from Chicago, Illinois, through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona before ending at Santa Monica, California, covering a total of 2,448 miles
yamit82 Said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1nJC4CXsok
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=508dn0u75JQ
yamit82 Said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RAfxiyMKAk
@ honeybee:
57 Chevy and Pontiac Firebird, 59 Porche
@ honeybee:
Replied. Got to take Dag out. be back asap.
@ yamit82:
Answered
@ honeybee:
I was on MT and asked.
yamit82 Said:
Ya, but on MT!!!!!!!!!
yamit82 Said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9QpDvhshOQ
honeybee Said:
Should I ask the obvious??
yamit82 Said:
he’s testing me.
@ honeybee:
I fear for you and your safety. Tell Tx your life is in his hands and I would take it unkindly if he let anything happen to you…..
I was such a bad risk they threw me into an insurance pool and it cost me plenty…
yamit82 Said:
Coming back from the Flea Market last Sat,a dump truck suddenly pulled in front of us and hit the brakes so hard they were smoking. TX hit the brakes and pulled to left, I thought we were gonners. Stopped just in time. I didn’t even scream or gasp, I have become a tough wingman.
honeybee Said:
Brings back memories…….
Yasgur Cleaned up and made a bundle…..I livd not too far from Woodstock about 45 min drive or for me 30 min. Had a heavy foot then I had a heavy car.
@ honeybee:
Agree!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
honeybee Said:
Brings back memories…….
Yasgur Cleaned up and made a bundle…..I livd not too far from Woodstock about 45 min drive or for me 30 min. Had a heavy foot then I had a heavy car.