The Foreign Ministers of the EU Member States failed on Tuesday 18 May to adopt a unanimous position on the situation in the Near East, at a time when the violence between Israel and Palestine is at its worst since 2014.
While 26 EU Foreign Ministers supported the “takeaways” of High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell, Hungary distanced itself.
“I am happy to say that 26 of the 27 supported the general direction of the discussions”, explained the High Representative, who had convened the videoconference as a matter of urgency in order to coordinate the European response, saying he was “quite satisfied with this important support”. “These are my takeaways, but they received a lot of support”, he explained.
However, Mr Borrell admitted that he found it difficult to understand how anyone could disagree with the text.
“There is a great convergence of messages. Sometimes there are questions of order or weighting in which things are qualified; these are called nuances rather than divisions, but nuances sometimes prevent unanimous agreements”, explained an EU source after the meeting.
“I have a general problem with these European statements on Israel... These are usually very much one-sided, and these statements do not help, especially not under current circumstances, when the tension is so high”, justified Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó.
Already on Sunday, Hungary blocked a statement by the EU’s ambassador to the UN in the Security Council. The subject of the Near East is often the subject of differences between EU Member States.
Call for an immediate end to the violence
On the substance, the Member States—minus Hungary—stress that the priority is the immediate cessation of all violence and the implementation of a ceasefire. “The objective is to protect civilians and allow full humanitarian access to Gaza”, the High Representative explained. He described the high number of civilian casualties, deaths, and injuries, including children, caused by the outbreak of violence as “unacceptable”. More than 200 civilians have already died.
“We condemn the rocket attacks on Israeli territory. We fully support Israel’s right to defend itself, but we also believe that it must do so in a proportionate manner and in compliance with international humanitarian law”, explained the High Representative.
He also recalled the EU’s position on the need to respect the status quo for the Holy Sites, the EU’s support for not proceeding with the expulsions of the Palestinians from Sheikh Jarrah, and the need to hold Palestinian elections, calling for this process not to be blocked.
Seeking a solution to the conflict
Once calm is restored, the High Representative is ready to engage in finding a solution to the conflict. “The security of Israelis and Palestinians requires a real political solution, because only a real political solution can bring peace. For this to happen, a political perspective must be restored”, Mr Borrell assessed. And he recalled that the status quo was not an option.
Once the violence has stopped and the ceasefire is in place, “we must engage to reopen a political perspective, exploit space for re-engagement between the parties, develop confidence-building measures, improve the living conditions of the people, and pave the way for a potential relaunch of a peace process”, he explained.
“The international community and the EU have looked the other way, hoping that the problem would solve itself. This did not happen. In order to find a solution, we have to engage in the search for that solution”, Mr Borrell acknowledged. He therefore explained that the Europeans were renewing their commitment to their partners, in particular the United States, but also to the Quartet on the Middle East. The new EU Special Representative for the Middle East Peace Process will travel to the region to hold talks with the Quartet and others.
European Parliament condemns violence
In parallel to the video conference of the ministers, the MEPs debated the situation in plenary session. They called for an immediate cessation of hostilities and stressed the need to resume dialogue and negotiations on a two-state solution.
Several of them also called on the EU to do more. Thus, according to Pedro Marques (S&D, Portugal), the international community and the EU must take their responsibilities and, for David McAllister (EPP, Germany), the EU must continue its close dialogue with the United States, Egypt, and Jordan.
Hilde Vautmans (Renew Europe, Belgium), went further, calling on Mr Borrell to get on a plane to negotiate a new Oslo agreement. “We are at a very sad stage where nobody expects anything serious from us. It is difficult to find a common position beyond empty words. [...] The EU is not a diplomatic champion, but it has the tools to push the parties to a lasting settlement”, said Jordi Solé (Greens/EFA, Spain).
While the ID group, through Anna Bonfrisco (Italy), and the ECR group, through Charlie Weimers (Sweden), supported Israel, Manu Pineda (The Left, Spain) highlighted the situation of the Palestinians. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)