EU Ambassador to Israel Lars Faaborg-Andersen
says Israel will find itself increasingly isolated if it continues
settlement construction and the peace talks fail • And the Palestinians
have been told they cannot just sit and wait for a peace deal, he says.
The EU has been frustrated
by Israeli announcements of new construction across the Green Line
|
Photo credit: AP  |
Both sides in the Israeli-Palestinian peace
talks risk paying a high price in losing European Union trade and aid if
negotiations collapse, the EU ambassador to Israel said on Wednesday.
For long seen as a "payer, not a player" in
the region, the European Union has started making clear that its role as
Israel's biggest trade partner and the Palestinians' largest donor
should not be taken for granted.
"We have made it clear to the parties that
there will be a price to pay if these negotiations falter," ambassador
Lars Faaborg-Andersen told reporters.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is trying
to draw up a broad framework deal that would open the way for a final
round of detailed discussions to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,
covering all the core elements dividing the two sides.
However, despite more than five months of talks, there has been no sign of any imminent breakthrough.
The EU has grown especially frustrated by a
number of Israeli announcements since the talks were renewed in July of
new construction across the Green Line.
"If Israel were to go down the road of
continued settlement expansion and were there not to be any result in
the current talks, I am afraid that what will transpire is a situation
where Israel finds itself increasingly isolated," Faaborg-Andersen said.
A major private Dutch pension fund announced
earlier this month that it was divesting from five large Israeli banks
because of their operations in the settlements, and Norwegian and
Swedish funds are considering similar moves.
While EU states are not advising firms to cut
investments in Israel, officials say companies might act unilaterally to
avoid any backlash from clients increasingly disenchanted with Israel's
presence in Judea and Samaria.
Economy and Trade Minister Naftali Bennett
(Habayit Hayehudi) on Monday made light of the possibility of a boycott
on Israel and has suggested that the government should look to bolster
ties with emerging markets to offset problems with Europe.
Despite Israel's intimate ties with the United
States, the European Union is its biggest economic partner, accounting
for almost a third of the country's exports and imports.
Faaborg-Andersen questioned how quickly Israel could change focus.
"To think you can shift all your cooperation,
trade, everything overnight to India, China and Russia, well I have my
doubts," he said.
The 28-nation EU has potentially even more
leverage over the Palestinians, providing some 1 billion euros of
assistance each year to the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority, making
it by far the largest donor to the West Bank economy.
"It has been made very clear to the
Palestinians that just sitting around and waiting is not an option,"
said Faaborg-Andersen, warning that donor fatigue was already setting
in.
However, he said Israel also risked losing out if an increasingly frustrated EU decided to cut PA funding.
"I think it is realized in Israel that this money is key
to the stability of the West Bank and in Gaza," he said. "If we don't
provide the money, I think there is a great likelihood that Israel would
have to provide far more."
No comments:
Post a Comment