“The machinery, until it is put into operation, costs.” It is one of the reflections of a diplomatic source on the review of the EU Commercial Agreement with Israel that the high representative, Kaja Kallas, will put on the table of the Foreign Ministers this Monday and that the Foreign Action Service took to send to the Member States on Friday afternoon. The report points to the “signs” of human rights violations by Israel in Palestine, but does not have any political valuation or proposal to punish in breach of article 2 of the Association Agreement. Before even having the document in their hands, numerous European countries assumed that this Monday there would be no concrete decisions. The EU is therefore the brake since the head of diplomacy said a few weeks ago that the intention was to raise “options” and that the meeting came out “results.”
However, community sources now point out that you have to “step by step.” And that the first is that Kallas raises the report that has been prepared by his department regarding the evaluation of compliance by Israel of the fulfillment of his obligations regarding human rights and international law. And there Kallas already pointed out for the first time last week in the European Parliament that Netanyahu is violating international law with the siege of the Gaza Strip. The document is less taxative and is limited to pointing out “signs” of these breaches after collecting dozens of violations by the Netanyahu Benjamin army: ranging from an “unprecedented level -of murders and injuries of civilians” to the forced displacement of 90% of the Gazatí population.
Although the collection of the testimonies of independent organizations on the ground draw a bleak panorama, the second step will have to wait. It is not expected that the 27 will reach an agreement on what concrete measures to take within the framework of the commercial agreement and that partial decisions would pass, since the total suspension of the agreement does not come to be raised, despite the fact that one of the parties is breaking it. “The high representative will present the review and listen to the reactions of the Foreign Ministers over the following steps.” Other sources postpone the decision to the next meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council in July since the heads of government mark the way in the European Council next week.
“The important thing is the signal given by the high representative that this process began. 17 Member States supported him, but those not all agree with punishing Israel.
“It is a political tool. Through this process, we want to put pressure on Israel to change its behavior. We have the perception that Israel is concerned about this process. So I have the impression that they are feeling the pressure. But we do not want to suspend the dialogue with Israel,” support sources from one of the countries that promoted the review of the agreement.
“The increasingly favorable state of opinion is extended, but it takes their time,” other sources point out, which recognize that it is a “very difficult step to give the opposition of many member states.” The equidistance of many capitals, such as Berlin, with Israel is total. The EU took six months of Massacre in Gaza to ask that there was a stop the fire and, when Pedro Sánchez and the then Irish prime minister, Leo Varadkar, requested the review of the commercial agreement in February 2024, barely reaped the support of a handful of countries, such as Slovenia or Belgium, which have a harder position with Netyahu's excess.
In fact, those countries and five more (Portugal, Poland, Finland, Luxembourg and Sweden) summoned the EU to cut trade with occupied Palestinian territories, as a pressure formula, in addition, at the gates of the appointment in which “results” were going to be obtained with respect to the review of the commercial agreement. In the Kallas team they limit themselves to saying that they “take note” of that petition, whose starting point is the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice that declared these territories illegal and urged to “refrain” to trade with those territories.
But the EU is not even able to agree on new sanctions on the violent holiday settlers for the veto of Hungary when there are countries such as the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia that have sanctioned two Ultras Ultras Ministers of Netyahu for “inciting violence” against the Palestinians.
