Israel should ban all 26 former European leaders calling for sanctions against Israel, UN imposition of Palestinian state by April

Robin Shepherd
www.robinshepherdonline.com
11 December '10

European extremism against Israel reached a new low this week with a letter from 26 former top officials to EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton calling for sanctions against Israel and the abandonment of a negotiated solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict in favour of a UN-imposed solution if Israel does not stop settlement building by April 2011. Ashton is signalling that there will be no change to current policy for the moment, but the tide in Europe is clearly now turning and the risk is that change along such lines is only a matter of time.

Former EU foreign policy supremo Javier Solana, best known on matters Jewish for suppressing a 2003 (EUMC) report outlining the growing problem of Muslim anti-Semitism in Europe, was among the signatories of the letter which was sponsored by former French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine and former EU commissioner from Britain Chris Patten. Other notable signatories include Italy’s Romano Prodi and Giuliano Amato, Richard von Weizsaecker and Helmut Schmidt of Germany, Ireland’s Mary Robinson, Spain’s Felipe Gonzalez and Norway’s Thorvald Stoltenberg.

So, what to say about this? Mainly, Israel should stop pussy-footing around — ban each and every one of these people from entering the state of Israel or having any contact with Israeli embassy staff in their countries or anyone else’s. This is important for a number of reasons:

First, the 26 have launched an all out assault on Israel and Israel needs to respond. What European leaders fear more than anything is that they will be made irrelevant. By making this bunch persona non grata and isolating them, Israel will be sending a message that should the EU change tack along the lines the 26 are recommending, it will become as irrelevant to peace making in the Middle East as they are.

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