Spain will impose its own sanctions on violent settlers in the West Bank in the absence of an agreement in the EU

Spain will impose sanctions on violent settlers in the West Bank.

This was confirmed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, this Monday in Brussels.

The Government of Pedro Sánchez is already preparing a package with “a few dozen” names due to the lack of progress in approving sanctions in the EU.

The measure, which requires unanimity, has been blocked by Hungary during the meeting held by European foreign ministers in the Belgian capital.

“It has not been possible to do it to Twenty-Seven, unanimously, so what we are going to do is act individually,” Albares stressed.

Spain thus follows the path of the United States, France and the United Kingdom, which have approved their own restrictive measures.

Belgium has also assured that it is advancing its own sanctions against the violent people who harass the Palestinian population, destroy their homes and try to expel them to settle in the territory.

“At the European Union level we have been debating for a long time about the application of sanctions to these violent Israeli settlers with the Palestinians in the West Bank and, therefore, we cannot afford to wait any longer,” said Albares.

“The situation in Gaza is catastrophic and dramatic, but the situation in the West Bank is also very tense,” the minister insisted after the meeting with his counterparts.

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Spain, one of the most critical countries in the EU with the Israeli offensive on Gaza, is already analyzing a list of names of violent settlers to sanction them, restrictions that fundamentally imply a ban on entry into the country.

Each case must be supported with legal arguments and then it will be the central government that will approve the list, Albares explained.

In addition, the Executive is preparing a new financial support package for the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), in addition to the 3.5 million announced and the 10 million delivered in December, the minister said.

In December, the Foreign Action Service (SEAE), led by the high representative for Foreign Policy and Security, Josep Borrell, proposed this restrictive measure on “extremists who attack civilians”, as EL PAÍS reported.

But the initiative, with fifteen names and despite the fact that Washington has also acted in the same way, has not achieved unanimity among the 27 member states.

This Monday's meeting has managed to overcome the reluctance of the Czech Republic, but not of Hungary.

The Government of national-populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán opposes European sanctions that seek to fight against the impunity of the violence experienced in the West Bank and try to prevent the escalation in the area from going further.

Budapest has also opposed the EU, with one voice, demanding that Israel not attack Rafah, the town in southern Gaza where Israeli forces urged the population to take refuge and where they are now planning a ground operation. .

Instead, Borrell launched a call this Monday to the Government of Benjamin Netanyahu, on behalf of the other 26 member states, demanding an “immediate humanitarian pause that leads to a sustainable ceasefire, the unconditional release of the hostages and the provision of humanitarian assistance,” said the head of community diplomacy.

“The only thing within our reach is to deploy all the political and diplomatic push to demand that this operation not be launched,” acknowledged Borrell, who has warned of the risk of a “huge number of civilian deaths” if Israel Rafah, where more than a million Palestinians are taking refuge, is attacked.

“In other wars, civilians, non-combatants, flee.

In Gaza they cannot, they are locked in a perimeter and cannot escape,” Borrell stressed.

The head of Spanish diplomacy has also asked the high European representative to analyze as soon as possible whether the violations by the Israeli army of international humanitarian legislation in Gaza contravene the EU association agreement with Israel, a treaty that has human rights in its core.

Albares has demanded that this report be available in March, at the next meeting of the European Council, so that leaders can analyze it.

“We hope that everything can be resolved through dialogue, but there are mechanisms at our disposal,” warned the Spanish Foreign Minister.

Putting on the table the EU-Israel association agreement, which generates trade exchanges of 63 billion euros annually, represents one of the EU's greatest pressure formulas, but its suspension (or that of any of its clauses) is difficult.

For total suspension, the unanimity of the 27 countries is required, although to paralyze some of its most commercial points it only requires a majority, according to community sources.

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