The EU’s former Foreign Policy Chief, Josep Borrell, stated that the bloc must take a more assertive stance against Israel that has been violating the international law in its war on Gaza, according to Arab News.
In an article for Foreign Affairs magazine, Borrell stressed that the EU has a “duty” to intervene over the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
Need for Joint Plan
Co-authored with Kalypso Nicolaidis, the article affirmed that the EU has to make its joint plan as Europe can no longer afford to linger at the margin.
“Not only is Europe’s own security at stake, but more important, European history imposes a duty on Europeans to intervene in response to Israel’s violations of international law,” the article said.
Last week, EU’s Foreign Policy Chief, Kaja Kallas, said that it was “very clear” Israel had violated its human rights commitments during its war on Gaza.
In May, Borrell accused Israel of “carrying out the largest ethnic-cleansing operation since the end of the Second World War.”
Authors’ Suggestions
Both authors said that Europe’s conflicting response to Gaza’s humanitarian crisis can be partly explained by the hesitation of some countries such as Germany, Hungary and Austria to take action against Israel for historical reasons.
They wrote that EU member states could use Article 20 of the EU’s treaty to “allow for at least nine member states to come together to utilize certain foreign policy tools not related to defense.”
“Because such an action has never been taken before, those states would have to explore what (it) … would concretely allow them to do,” the Foreign Affairs article said.
The authors also stated that the bloc should act as a powerful mediator in the Middle East.
“Some EU leaders cautiously backed the International Criminal Court’s investigations, while others, such as Austria and Germany, have declined to implement its arrest warrants against Israeli officials,” they wrote.
Overall, the EU, as a bloc, has been “largely relegated to the sidelines, divided internally and overshadowed in ceasefire diplomacy by the US and regional actors such as Egypt and Qatar. Shouldn’t the EU also have acted as a mediator?”
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