Brussels – The European Union is assessing new ways to push Israel back to the peace negotiating table with the Palestinians for a deal based on a two-state solution, working in tandem with the United States, EU officials say.
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The EU is exploring new diplomatic terrain and could consider ways to discourage Europeans from buying products from Israeli settlements it believes are illegal.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s election rhetoric has fueled doubts about Israel’s commitment to a two-state solution — a cornerstone of EU and U.S. policies for ending the Middle East conflict.
“We will not forget or ignore what was being said during the campaign and in particular some of the incendiary statements by Prime Minister Netanyahu,” German EU lawmaker Reinhard Buetikofer told The Associated Press.
An EU diplomat dealing with Middle East issues said the Israeli premier’s remarks could amount to “a fundamental breach” of the two-state policy.
The Europeans are aware that the rhetoric could remain at fever pitch for the next month as the Israeli leader negotiates a new coalition government and they are reluctant to move too far too fast.
Middle East peace moves have been frozen since the last round of U.S.-brokered talks collapsed last April. Since then, Israel fought a 50-day war against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip and advanced plans to build hundreds of new homes in east Jerusalem, which the Palestinians claim as their capital.
The Palestinians, meanwhile, have sought unilaterally to have their long-hoped for state recognized by nations, like EU member Sweden recently, or organizations such as the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands.
To try to end the stalemate, the EU and the U.S want to breathe new life into the diplomatic Quartet — the U.S., EU, United Nations and Russia — and the Europeans have just named a new envoy to the region.
Your headline is completely misleading. The EU isn’t trying to “coax” Israel to peace talks. As the article itself says, the EU is looking for “…new ways to push Israel back to the peace negotiating table…”. This is the opposite of coaxing.
The Palestinians need coaxing; the Jews need to be pushed. This is how the world looks at things.
no one is pushing Bibi into anything
That is exactly why he was voted for, to form a coalition and do whats best for Israel and not what,s best for president behaima
Israel needs to officially make all liberated land to be officially part of Israel.
Israel is OK with two state solution as long as the Islamic state will be inside of Brussels or inside of Obama’s back yard or anywhere else in the EU back yard but is not giving away Israel’s own, G-d given land.
All the Goyim know that G-d gave Israel to the Jews and NOT to the Palestinians. Although all Goyim know it, they continue to pressure Israel only because Israel is to ashamed to say, what it says in the first Rashi, in Chumash.
Washington DC is perfectly fine place to be used as a new Palestinian State and Obama can be elected to run it.
You will not forget, you son of a murderer natzi?