By sacrificing Palestine, Europe betrays itself
People protest against the war in Gaza and demand sanctions against Israel in Berlin on 21 June 2025
Andrea Teti writes in Al Jazeera on 1 July 2025:
“Law is interpreted for friends and applied to enemies,” Italian statesman Giovanni Giolitti once said.
There are few better examples of this than the way the European Union bends over backwards to avoid addressing Israel’s severe breaches of international law and the terms of its association agreement with the bloc.
On May 20, the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council (FAC) voted to conduct a review of whether Israel was denying Palestinians’ human rights by preventing humanitarian aid from entering Gaza.
A month later, the same body concluded: “There are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations under Article 2 of the EU-Israel Association Agreement.” Indications …
On June 26, EU heads of government at a European Council meeting concluded that they “noted” those indications and invited the FAC to “continue discussions” in July.
It is understandable that some initially welcomed the vote to review the EU-Israel Association Agreement back in May. It is only human to hold on to anything that gives hope that action will finally be taken to protect the human rights of the Palestinian people. Unfortunately, the entire “debate” over the EU-Israel Association Agreement is simply a sham. It does not represent serious action on by the EU to address the atrocities Israel is committing in Gaza and elsewhere in the occupied Palestinian territory. It deflects growing criticism by giving the impression that the EU may finally be thinking of doing something. More importantly, it distracts from the obligations which the EU and its members are legally bound to fulfil.
Human rights pretences
Twenty months into Israel’s devastating war in Gaza, Israel’s breaches of human rights and international law are so extensive that there can be no doubt about their relevance to the EU-Israel Association Agreement.