The European Union is preparing new sanctions against Israeli settlements which are to be enacted if peace negotiations fail to resume after the 17 March general elections in Israel, the Walla! News site reported citing unnamed Israeli officials.
Israeli officials in recent weeks met with Europe's most important foreign ministries at the EU headquarters in Brussels, an Israeli official told Walla! News. He said that the planned measures in Europe will be focused on "the illegality of the settlements under international la" - without any distinction between "settlement blocs" generally agreed upon to remain in Israel and isolated communities.
"The guiding principle is their deepening and emphasizing the absolute difference they make between Israel within the Green Line and Israel beyond the Green Line," the official said, referring to the 1949 Armistice lines. "They talks about sanctions against companies that do business across the border, to support legal action of the Palestinians over the settlements and the renewal of the proposal for the establishment of a Palestinian state through the UN Security Council."
"The assumption is in Europe that a right-wing government will be elected in Israel, and thus it would be easier to promote these measures" against it, the official added.
"This is not something that a group of junior officials has been advancing in discussions off to the side," the official insisted. "It's a process that has been shared by all the EU countries and that has been allowed to advance by senior officials in Brussels."
"The elections were able to delay the process, for two reasons - partially because the EU does not want to be seen as interfering, and partially because some countries hope that after the elections there will be a chance to resume negotiations with the Palestinians," the official added. "However, at the moment, it doesn't look like that will happen, so they are readying the sanctions now."