MidnightCall Magazine
News From Israel MagazineTies Strengthened Despite Palestinian Objections
The European Union is to boost its ties with Israel, despite objections from the Palestinian Authority and other Arab governments over continued illegal settlement building in the West Bank and Jerusalem.
“Today we mark a new phase in the relations between Israel and the EU,” said Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni speaking to reporters alongside Dimitrij Rupel, her Slovenian counterpart, whose country currently holds the six-month rotating EU presidency.
Mr. Rupel said the EU and Israel were “elevating our relations to a new level of more intense, more fruitful, more influential cooperation,” according to AFP.
EU foreign ministers made the decision at their annual bilateral meeting with the Jewish state, the EU-Israel Association Council, which took place in Luxembourg.
As a result, Israel has won three key advances: increased diplomatic co-operation with the 27-state bloc, participation in European agencies and the establishment of a working group to investigate the country’s integration into the European single market.
The advance in relations comes without reference to complaints from the Palestinian Authority that no such moves should be made so long as Israel continues to allow the construction of settlements in the occupied territories, an activity which is a violation of international law.
Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayad lobbied EU capitals to not expand relations with Israel unless settlement construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem were halted. Other Arab governments made similar appeals, in particular Egypt.
In a letter to the 27 member states, the prime minister wrote that no new ties should be established “until after Israel implements all of its commitments, especially those related to halting all settlement activities and other violations of human rights in Palestine.”
Additionally, some EU national diplomats have been worried that such an agreement endangers the success of the first meeting of the Union for the Mediterranean – the proposed grouping that is intended to strengthen relations with all of Europe’s southern neighbors.
Israel has been invited to the meeting—to take place in Paris—alongside North African nations, Turkey, the Palestinian territories, Lebanon and Syria.
-EUobserver, 17 June 2008
Here we recognize the powers of money and technology. Israel needs Europe desperately, but Europe is also dependent upon Israel, the only democratic state within the planned Mediterranean Union. Political decisions are being made more and more under economic pressures.
It is our understanding that Israel will be accepted into the Mediterranean Union and through it become part of the European Union.
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