EU agrees sanctions on Israeli settlers over West Bank violence

Key developments are emerging from the global stage. EU agrees sanctions on Israeli settlers over West Bank violence8 minutes ago Share Save Add as preferred on GoogleIone WellsJerusalemEPAIsraeli settlers set fire to two vehicles and a Bedouin tent south of Nablus in one attack last monthThe twenty-seven foreign ministers of the European Union approved new sanctions on Monday on Israeli settlers over rising violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. There has been a surge in attacks by settlers since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, the UN has recorded. Settlements - illegal under international law - are built on Israeli-occupied land in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, areas Palestinians claim for a future state.

The EU foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said it was "high time we move from deadlock to delivery... extremisms and violence carry consequences. "A change in government in Hungary ended months of delays to the EU's plans for further sanctions, which had been blocked by the former right-wing Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban, a close ally of Israel.

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The French foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot wrote on social media that the EU was "sanctioning today the main Israeli organisations guilty of supporting the extremist and violent colonisation of the West Bank". Israel's foreign minister Gideon Sa'ar said the decision was "arbitrary and political" and that Israel would continue to "stand for the right of Jews to settle in the heart of our homeland". Successive Israeli governments have allowed and encouraged settlements to grow.

Expansion has risen sharply since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned to power in late 2022 at the head of a right-wing, pro-settler coalition, as well as the start of the Gaza war, triggered by the armed Palestinian group Hamas's 7 October 2023 attack on Israel. There is still technical and legal work that must be done in the EU before the sanctions are officially imposed. EU officials said that seven settlers or settler organisations would be sanctioned.

The EU also agreed to sanction more representatives from Hamas. ReutersThe Sa-Nur settlement has been recently reestablished on a hill south-west of JeninIsraeli media have reported that the sanctioned individuals and organisations include Daniella Weiss, who is already sanctioned by the UK and is known as the "godmother" of the settler movement. It is also reported that they include the organisations Nachala and Regavim, movements that promote settlements, as well as HaShomer Yosh and Amana, organisations that help to finance and assist unauthorised settlements known as outposts.

Meir Deutsch, the CEO of Regavim, and Avichai Suissa, the CEO of HaShomer Yosh, are also reportedly on the list. Suissa was sanctioned by the US in 2024, but removed from the sanctions list under Donald Trump. Israel has built about 160 settlements housing some 700,000 Jews since it occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war.

The development has drawn wide international attention, with diplomatic circles watching closely.