Sunniva Rose
The National / August 29, 2024
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Israeli ministers are spreading ‘unacceptable hate messages’.
The EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Thursday that Israeli cabinet members are spreading “unacceptable hate messages against Palestinians”.
Borrell described their actions as “incitation to commit war crimes”, as he arrived for arrived for an informal meeting of EU foreign affairs ministers in Brussels.
He did not give names of the Israeli cabinet ministers he was referring to, but has in the past criticized Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
Borrell said he would call for sanctions against the ministers but that it was up to the EU’s 27 member states to decide whether they all supported such a measure – which is unlikely.
Belgium’s Foreign Affairs Minister Hadja Lahbib said that “Belgium supports more sanctions against leaders of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and violent settlers”.
Her Swedish counterpart, Tobias Billstrom, said there was a “growing problem” of extremist settler violence in the occupied West Bank.
“We’d also like to talk about listing more extremist settlers,” he said.
Sunniva Rose reports from Brussels
___________
Israel Foreign Ministry
on X – August 28, 2024
Foreign Minister
Yisrael Katz
“The IDF has been operating with full force since last night in the Jenin and Tulkarm refugee camps to dismantle Iranian-Islamic terror infrastructures established there. Iran is working to establish an eastern terror front against Israel in Judea and Samaria, following the Gaza and Lebanon model, by funding and arming terrorists and smuggling advanced weapons from Jordan. We must address this threat with the same determination used against terror infrastructures in Gaza, including temporary evacuation [sic] of Palestinian residents and any necessary measures. This is a war, and we must win it.”
