EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Thursday he has started the process of asking member states if they want to impose sanctions on “some Israeli ministers”, Reuters reports.

“I initiated the procedure to ask the member states if they consider [it] appropriate to include in our list of sanctions some Israeli ministers [who] have been launching unacceptable hate messages against the Palestinians, and proposing things that clearly go against international law,” he told reporters ahead of a meeting with EU foreign affairs ministers in Brussels.

He did not name any of the Israeli ministers to whom he was referring.