BRUSSELS, April 9: The European Union on Tuesday dismissed Israel’s partial withdrawal from Palestinian areas as “not at all enough” and demanded an immediate ceasefire to keep the Middle East peace process alive.
With patience wearing thin within the EU over Israel’s military offensive in the West Bank, momentum appeared to be gathering for at least a debate on whether to slap trade sanctions on the Jewish state.
EU president Spain said on Monday it might convene an urgent meeting to discuss suspending the association pact that gives Israel preferential trade terms, and members of the European Parliament stepped up calls for sanctions.
The Israeli army pulled out of two West Bank cities on Tuesday, but raided another village and kept a tight grip on other Palestinian-ruled areas it has occupied since a suicide bomber killed 27 people in Israel two weeks ago.
“This is not what the international community has required,” said a senior EU diplomat.
“NOT ENOUGH”: “The international community has sought a full withdrawal and a ceasefire immediately. Immediately means immediately. This is only the beginning, it is not at all enough.”
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana was expected to make the same point later on Monday during a European Parliament debate on the Middle East crisis, arguing that Israel was jeopardizing its own security by prolonging the occupation.
“...whatever the initial strategy or intentions, one likely result of operation ‘Defensive Shield’ will be the destruction of the Palestinian Authority and its security structures,” Solana wrote in an article for Britain’s Financial Times.
“That will damage beyond repair any prospect of implementing the Tenet or any other political and security plan reliant on cooperation from these structures.”
Central Intelligence Agency Director George Tenet secured both sides’ agreement to a security cooperation plan last year, but it was never implemented.
Solana was due to leave on Tuesday night for Madrid for meetings with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who began a Middle East peace drive this week.
ASSOCIATION PACT: Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Pique said on Monday that the outcome would influence whether or not he convened a special session of the 15-nation bloc’s association council with Israel.
Ahead of the parliamentary debate, the Greens lined up behind a call made last week by the Socialists, the second-largest bloc, for a suspension of the association pact .
The European Parliament will attempt to agree a resolution on an EU response to Israel for a vote on Wednesday. The resolution is not binding on EU governments.
Suspension of Israel’s preferred trade status would carry weight as the EU accounts for some 40 per cent of Israeli trade.
But diplomats said the EU was most unlikely to use this lever, one of the few it has, to put pressure on Israel because several states, notably Britain, Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark, would not hear of it.
The EU has traditionally played second fiddle to the United States in Middle East diplomacy, partly because of its own divisions and partly because Israel sees it as pro-Palestinian.
Last week Israel barred Solana and Pique from meeting Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, who is under siege by Israeli troops at his office in the West Bank city of Ramallah.—Reuters
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