The high representative of the EU, Josep Borrell, once again raises the decibels against the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he has accused of “having been personally boycotting for 30 years” the two-state solution to the conflict with Palestine that has a broad consensus of the international community. A day after Netanyahu rejected the creation of a Palestinian state in any post-war scenario, Borrell has opted that the two-state solution “must be imposed from the outside to bring peace” and has gone one step further by directly accusing that country to “create Hamas” to prevent it.
“Hamas has been financed by the Government of Israel to try to weaken the Authority [Nacional] Palestine of Fatah,” stated the socialist leader in a speech at the University of Valladolid, where he was named Honorary Doctor.
Borrell has made a firm plea for the recognition of the two States as “the only solution is to create two States that share the land for which they have been dying for 100 years.” “Everyone supports the two-state solution. “Everyone says it, except the Israeli Government,” said the high representative, who believes that the EU must remain united to face the conflict in the Middle East, as has happened to a certain extent in the case of Ukraine, as he recalled.
However, deep divisions have emerged in the EU over how to approach the conflict and, until now, it has limited itself to calling for humanitarian pauses so that aid can enter the increasingly devastated Gaza Strip. There is not even a consensus to ask for a ceasefire, although more and more voices are joining; But countries like Germany consider that this immediate call may go against Israel’s right to defend itself after the October 7 attacks. And, at the moment, nine EU countries recognize the Palestinian State. Pedro Sánchez, for example, was open to making this recognition unilaterally.
Borrell has also criticized himself by recognizing that the international community has abandoned its functions and has intoned the “mea culpa” for having “preached a lot about the two-state solution” but having done “little to make it a reality.” ”Today there are four times as many settlers in the West Bank as there were 30 years ago. There are 700,000. The international community considers them illegal, but has done nothing,” he rebuked.
“We will not emerge from the tragedy we are experiencing now without a very strong commitment from the international community,” added the head of European diplomacy: “If we do not intervene strongly, the spiral of hatred and violence will continue from generation to generation, from funeral to at a funeral, when the seeds of hatred that are being sown in Gaza today bloom.”
Borrell’s words came 72 hours before the EU foreign ministers, chaired by him, meet in Brussels to analyze the situation in both Ukraine and the Middle East. At the meeting next Monday they will hold “informal exchanges” with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel, Israel Katz, the Foreign Ministers of Saudi Arabia, Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud; Jordan, Ayman Safadi, and Egypt, as well as with the Secretary General of the League of Arab States, Ahmed Aboul Gheit. Also with the head of diplomacy of the Palestinian Authority, Riyad al-Maliki.