Israel Matzav

EU claims US 'quietly supporting' settlement sanctions

A senior European official told an Israeli diplomat last week that the United States is 'quietly supporting' Europe's sanctions against Israeli 'settlements' according to Haaretz's Barak Ravid.

Last week, senior Foreign Ministry officials said, Ambassador to the European Union David Walzer met with Helga Schmid, the deputy secretary general of the European External Action Service and one of EU foreign policy czar Catherine Ashton’s top aides. The meeting dealt with the crisis in EU-Israel relations sparked by the new guidelines.

Walzer told Schmid that Israel won’t participate in the EU’s new research and development program, Horizon 2020, if it is governed by the guidelines as they now stand. Schmid, according to a senior Foreign Ministry official, responded that Israel would be better off not trying to threaten the EU with freezing negotiations over Horizon 2020.

“You should know that we received support for the new guidelines on the settlements from all the European Union’s member states,” the official quoted her as saying. “We’re also receiving tacit support from the American administration.”

The EU mission in Israel declined to comment. The U.S. State Department told Haaretz that this was an EU decision, so all inquiries should be addressed to Brussels.

Previously, American officials have said they weren’t informed in advance about the timing of the publication of the new guidelines – shortly before Secretary of State John Kerry announced the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, while he was still trying to get both sides to agree to restart the talks. Nevertheless, neither the State Department nor the White House has publicly condemned the EU move.

The only time a senior American official did make a negative comment on the matter was during a closed meeting between Kerry and American Jewish leaders three weeks after the guidelines were published. According to leaks from that meeting, one Jewish leader asked about the EU move, and Kerry responded that it hindered progress on Israeli-Palestinian talks.

In contrast, senior State Department officials said that publishing the guidelines just then actually 
contributed to the effort to restart negotiations. The EU move bolstered Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, they said, making it easier for him to agree to hold talks despite Israel’s refusal to freeze settlement construction. At the same time, it pressured Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to agree to the talks by making it clear that if negotiations didn’t resume, Israel’s international isolation would worsen.

 That last line sounds a lot like what Jeffrey Goldberg reported on Tuesday, doesn't it? You don't think the 'senior State Department officials' who are Kerry's immediate underlings are trying to put pressure on Israel, do you? And yes, of course, the Americans could pressure the Europeans... if they wanted to.

Read the whole thing.

Labels: BDS, Binyamin Netanyahu, Catherine Ashton, European anti-Semitism, Golan Heights, John Kerry, Judea and Samaria

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:32 AM