Research areas

Send Print Share

Archive / Other publications

Europe, Israel and Palestine: endgame?

28/04/2008 By George Joffe

The Palestinian crisis is steadily worsening as Israel and its Western backers continue to exclude and marginalise Hamas from the political process. Little can be expected from the Annapolis initiative in November 2007 for no positive steps towards constructing a viable peace by the end of 2008 have taken place since then.

Instead the Gaza Strip has been isolated and the West Bank has been fragmented by settlements, “settler roads”, road blocks and the Separation Wall. In these circumstances, moderates in the region and elsewhere seek an alternative interlocutor to revive the peace process and the European Union has frequently been mentioned in this regard.

Europe, however, appears to have disqualified itself by abandoning its cherished principles of normative power and constructive engagement in favour of a securitised foreign policy that apes its American counterpart, even though the Union continues to supply emergency aid.

The roots for this policy choice seem to lie in Europe’s own adoption of America’s rejection of engagement with opponents it designates as “terrorist” and in European fears of the loss of America’s security umbrella, should it challenge the assumptions behind the trans-Atlantic relationship by a more independent approach to the problems of the Middle East.

In this Comment article, George Joffe argues that, having betrayed its own principles of normative power and constructive engagement, the European Union now has no viable alternative to offer.


Download the full version of this publication, available in English (66 kB)


Keywords

Conflict resolution Dialogue EU Gaza Strip and West Bank Israel MEPP Middle East and North Africa

Related publications

Bio author: George Joffe

George Joffe is a Research Fellow at the Centre and Visiting Professor of Geography at Kings College, London University. He specialises in the Middle East and North Africa and is currently engaged in a project studying connections between migrant communities and trans/national violence in Europe.