Palestinians seek EU arms ban on Israel

Date: 04/04/02

By David Cronin

PALESTINIAN human rights activists are calling on the EU to impose an arms embargo on Israel over its military onslaught against the occupied territories.

The campaigners claim there is ample evidence for such a ban to be introduced under the EU's 1998 code of conduct on arms exports, which seeks to avoid weapons sales to customer states where there is internal conflict or where authorities are likely to use them for 'repression'.

East Jerusalem-based group LAW (Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment) contends that the extrajudicial executions carried out by Israeli troops breach the code of conduct.

'Since there is no common system of monitoring the end use of European arms by the Israeli forces in the occupied Palestinian territories, only a full arms embargo will prevent European arms being used to commit war crimes and other human rights abuses,' said LAW spokesman Arjan El Fassed.

He believes the case for an embargo has been bolstered by the UK's recent admission that Israel had flouted a November 2000 assurance not to use British-manufactured equipment in the West Bank and Gaza.

London's Foreign Office Minister Ben Bradshaw said Israel had modified several Centurion tanks exported in 1958-70 for use as armoured personnel carriers in the occupied territories.

Nevertheless, the UK licensed about 20 million worth of arms for sale to Israel in 2001. France, Germany and The Netherlands also sell weapons there.

Dutch Liberal Lousewies van der Laan wants the European Parliament to push for an embargo during its Strasbourg session next week (8-11 April).

The move is necessary, the MEP feels, for the EU to back up the statement issued by leaders at last month's Barcelona summit that Israel 'must immediately withdraw its military forces from areas placed under control of the Palestinian Authority, stop extrajudicial killings, lift the closures and restrictions, freeze settlements and respect international law'.

Van der Laan also wants the EU to suspend its 'association agreement' with Israel because she says Ariel Sharon's government is not respecting the accord's provisions on human rights. 'The EU is still continuing business as usual with Israel and that's a very bad signal,' she remarked. 'Europe has to stop hiding behind the Americans on the Middle East. We keep on thinking we can't act without the Americans; let's do it and see what happens.'

But Commission President Romano Prodi defended the association agreement yesterday (3 April), calling it an 'instrument which promotes dialogue'. He said it is 'not there to be used as an instrument for blackmail'.

Meanwhile, Israel's EU Ambassador Harry Kney-Tal this week criticised what he called Europe's fascination with Yasser Arafat. The Palestinian chief, said Kney-Tal, is a 'cult figure' in Europe. 'I don't want to compare it with Che Guevara but [the fascination] is somewhere along those lines,' he said. 'But Arafat opposes the values which Europe stands for.

'He is an authoritarian leader, not a democrat.'

The EU has been called upon by Palestinian human rights activists to impose an arms embargo on Israel over its military onslaught against the occupied territories.