The minister appears to follow in the footsteps of his Dutch counterpart Caspar Veldkamp who proposed to sanction Israel by reviewing the EU-Israel Association Agreement over ‘’the ongoing blockade of humanitarian aid in violation of international humanitarian law.’’
Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot will propose that the government impose sanctions on Israel in view of the situation in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.
He made the announcement on Thursday.
“Let’s be honest, the condemnations have had no impact on Israel. Every week that goes by, it gets worse. We can no longer just denounce, we have to act. That’s why I’m going to propose to the government various measures to sanction the Israeli government and violent settlers”, he wrote in a statement to the Belgian press agency Belga.
The success of such an initiative is not guaranteed, however, as demonstrated by the tensions in the discussions of the last few weeks in the Belgian House of Representatives between the government coalition parties on a text of a resolution relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“I hope it will be possible to converge on some of these sanctions in view of the horrors experienced in Gaza and elsewhere. Especially as Netanyahu reiterated on Tuesday his desire for all-out war in the Gaza Strip, neglecting the fate of the hostages and envisaging forced displacement of the population. Other European countries are mobilizing. We must remain coherent and vigorously defend human rights and international law. This has always been the compass of our foreign policy. And it must remain so!” he said.
The Belgian coalition government agreed last week on a common position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict which foresees the recognition of a Palestinian state under certain conditions : the release of all hostages, the dismantling of Hamas, the organization of free Palestinian elections and clear defined borders.
The Belgian government, which is composed of a coalition of center-left and center-right political parties, supports French President Emmanuel Macron’s initiative of organizing together with Saudi Arabia an international conference in June ‘’to advance towards a two-state solution and mutual recognition of Israel and Palestine.’’
Prévot, who is also Deputy Prime Minister in the government led by Bart De Wever, did not give any detail of the sanctions he mentioned but he appears to follow in the footsteps of his Dutch counterpart Caspar Veldkamp who proposed to sanction Israel by reviewing the EU-Israel Association Agreement over ‘’the ongoing blockade of humanitarian aid in violation of international humanitarian law.’’
Velkamp’s proposal will be discussed at a meeting of EU Foreign Minister on May 20 but it is unlikely to be adopted as unanimity is required for such sanctions and the EU member states are divided on the issue.