World Jewish News

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin (R) welcomes EU Council President Donald Tusk in Jerusalem in September. Since then EU-Israel relations soured around the labeling issue.

Israeli President Rivlin skips Brussels visit

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin has canceled his long-scheduled visit to Brussels where he was due to speak at a session of the European Parliament and meet EU senior officials on December 2.

Although the President’s Residence confirmed the trip was ‘’postponed’’ but did not give a reason for the change, it is widely believed that the cancellation is part of Israel’s strong protest against the EU’s new labeling guidelines for goods produced in Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and sold on the EU market.

The invitation to Rivlin had been extended earlier this year.

The EU Ambassador to Israel, Lars Faaborg-Andersen, was informed of Rivlin visit’s cancellation after being summoned to the Israeli foreign ministry in Jerusalem as a result of the labeling decision announcement by the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm.

The ambassador was also told that Jerusalem, which condemned the EU measure as ‘’discriminatory and tantamount to a boycott’’, was suspending its diplomatic dialogue with the EU in a number of European forums for a few weeks.

The EU’s’’Interpretattive Notice on indication of origin of goods from the territories occupied by Israel since June 1967’’ allows the EU member states to place labels ‘Product from Israeli settlement’’ instead of ‘’Product from Israel’’on goods produced over the Green Line.

The foreign ministry told Ambassador Lars Faaborg-Andersen the EU decision reflected the ‘’double standard’’ by which the EU treats Israel.

“During the meeting, Foreign Ministry representatives informed the ambassador that because of the recent EU decision, Israel is suspending its diplomatic dialogue with the EU in various forums in which it has meetings scheduled in the coming weeks,” the ministry stated.

The ministry’s spokesman Emmanuel Nachshon later clarified that the decision pertained mostly to Palestinian and human rights issues, but that all other bilateral dialogue – particularly in the areas of science, education, culture and agriculture – would continue.

Although there are hundreds of territorial conflicts in the world, Israel is the only place the EU has produced legislative guidelines for such labels, Jérusalem said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the EU should be “ashamed of itself,” as he lashed out against the decision before leaving Washington to return to Israel.

This “singles out Israel and not the 200 other conflicts around the world,” Netanyahu said.

“The EU has decided to label only Israel, and we are not prepared to accept the fact that Europe is labeling the side that is being attacked by terrorism. The Israeli economy is strong and will withstand this; those who will be hurt will be those Palestinians who work in Israeli factories,” he said.

The ministry added that “product labeling strengthens the radical elements advocating a boycott against Israel and denying Israel’s right to exist.

“It does not advance any political process between Israel and the Palestinians. The opposite is the case – it is bound to reinforce the Palestinian Authority’s refusal to conduct direct negotiations with Israel, negotiations that the EU claims to support,” the ministry said.

According to an EU source, Faaborg-Andersen told the ministry that the move is a “technical matter” that is not related to the peace process and added that it would not constrain relations with Israel.

Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely said the ministry would suspend all peace negotiations with the EU while Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said she would examine taking ‘’legal steps’’ against the EU.

As a symbolic measure to protest the EU boycott of Israeli goods, Israeli Agriculture Minister traded his European made Citroen car with a Japanese Mazda.

The consequences of the EU’s decision for the EU-Israel relations will surely be a ‘hot’’ topic when a delegation of members of the European Parliament from various polticial groups visits Jerusalem next Tuesday as part of the annual meeting with the Knesset, Israel’s parliament.

‘’The EU cannot play the role of an honest broker between Israel and the Palestinians when it targets only one of the parties,’’ Bastiaan Belder from the Netherlands, one of the members of the delegation, told EJP.

The first meeting of delegation will be Tuesday morning with the EU ambassador to Israel.

by Yossi Lempkowicz

EJP