The European Union has agreed to impose sanctions on Israeli settlers and leading Hamas figures.
Consensus was reached on the sanctions packages at a meeting of member states’ foreign ministers on Monday. The measures targeting Israeli settlers over violence against Palestinians in the West Bank were long-awaited, having been blocked by the self-styled illiberal government of Hungary’s former premier Viktor Orban.
That package targets three Israeli settlers and four settler organisations. However, their identities have not yet been publicly disclosed.
Israel quickly condemned the measures, asserting its position that Jews have the right to settle in the occupied West Bank, despite this being in violation of international law.
“It was high time we move from deadlock to delivery,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said in a social media post following the agreement. “Extremisms and violence carry consequences.”
Hungary’s former longtime Prime Minister Viktor Orban had blocked the sanctions for months. However, the appointment of new PM Peter Magyar on Saturday saw the veto quickly lifted.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot welcomed the turnaround, saying that the EU was “sanctioning the main Israeli organisations guilty of supporting the extremist and violent colonisation of the West Bank”.
“These most serious and intolerable acts must cease without delay,” he wrote on social media.
“The European Union has chosen, in an arbitrary and political manner, to impose sanctions on Israeli citizens and entities because of their political views and without any basis,” Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on social media.
“Israel has stood, stands, and will continue to stand for the right of Jews to settle in the heart of our homeland.”
Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir denounced the EU as “antisemitic”.
“To expect the antisemitic union to make a moral decision is like expecting the sun to rise in the west. While our enemies perpetrate attacks and murder Jews, the European Union is trying to tie the hands of those who defend themselves,” Ben Gvir said in a post on social media.
“The settlement enterprise will not be deterred. We will continue to build, to plant, to defend, and to settle throughout the entire land of Israel.”
Hamas leaders sanctioned
Barrot said the ministers had also decided to sanction the leadership of the Palestinian group Hamas, whose armed wing was a major participant in the attack on southern Israel from Gaza on October 7, 2023 that killed around 1,200 people and saw 240 taken captive.
“These most serious and intolerable acts must cease without delay,” Barrot wrote on social media.
“It is sanctioning the main leaders of Hamas, responsible for the worst antisemitic massacre in our history since the Shoah during which 51 French people lost their lives, a terrorist movement that must imperatively be disarmed and excluded from any participation in the future of Palestine,” Barrot said, using the Hebrew term to describe the Holocaust.
A senior Hamas official accused the EU of political hypocrisy and racism.
“It equates a fascist executioner who boasts of committing genocide and ethnic cleansing, a rogue state that violates every international law, with the victim who defends itself according to all laws and statutes,” Basem Naim told the Reuters news agency.–Al Jazeera
