EU states do not need ‘consensus’ to hold Israel accountable
As foreign ministers meet on Gaza and the West Bank, national governments cannot hide behind EU paralysis. On July 13, European Union foreign ministers are
As foreign ministers meet on Gaza and the West Bank, national governments cannot hide behind EU paralysis. On July 13, European Union foreign ministers are due to meet again at the Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels. The agenda includes an “exchange of views on Gaza and the West Bank” and is expected to cover settlement trade, the EU-Israel Association Agreement, possible sanctions on Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and proposals to restrict, rather than ban, goods from illegal Israeli settlements. If previous efforts are any guide, the July meeting will follow a familiar pattern: Hesitation, euphemism and no meaningful action to hold Israel accountable. The stated obstacle will likely be a “lack of consensus”. In practice, that phrase has become the bloc’s preferred way of masking collective inaction. Germany and Italy, backed by several Eastern European states, have repeatedly blocked meaningful action in response to Israel’s violations. Other member states, meanwhile, have remained largely paralysed, shifting responsibility between national governments and EU institutions instead of taking decisive steps. Yet the EU and its member states continue to invoke the language of international law while refusing to apply it when Israel is concerned. The gap between principle and practice, between rhetoric and action, is no longer a diplomatic inconsistency. It has become policy.
That is becoming harder to justify and harder to hide. According to reports on a leaked 2017 legal memo, the EU had already been advised that it had legal grounds to suspend the Association Agreement, the political and trade framework governing the bloc’s relations with Israel. Another investigation has shown that Israel has damaged or destroyed more than 150 million euros ($172m) in EU-funded infrastructure in Gaza and the West Bank without accountability, while settlement goods continue to enter European markets under misleading labels. At the same time, United Nations and human rights bodies have continued to document grave violations, including a June 2026 report by a UN human rights body that described the deliberate targeting of Palestinian children in Palestine as amounting to genocide, alongside crimes against humanity and war crimes. The recent episode involving EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas exposed how far the EU has submitted to Israeli pressure. Reports that she compared Israeli practices to apartheid in a closed meeting triggered a furious response from Israeli officials, with Israel’s foreign minister saying he was severing all contact with her until she retracted the remarks. The European Commission’s response was to send another commissioner to Israel to reassure officials that relations would remain intact. That is the real message from Brussels: Preserving ties with Israel matters more than internal solidarity, self-respect, or the EU’s stated commitment to international law and its own values.
The BriefWire