It’s wrong for the European Union to equate Palestinian terror which has claimed innocent civilian lives with the IDF military operations in the West Bank to eliminate that terror, Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Tuesday.
"There is no place to compare or create equity between the victims of terrorism on the Israeli side and the Palestinian terrorists supported by the Palestinian Authority,” Cohen said, according to a release from his office.
He spoke up after Borrell wrote an article in Project Syndicate in which he called for an end to violence by both Israelis and Palestinians as he spoke of the important role his 27-member bloc could play in a renewed peace process to create a two-state resolution to the conflict.
In the opening graph he stated, “Violence on the part of Israel settlers in the West Bank is increasingly threatening Palestinian lives and livelihoods — almost always with impunity, “ Borrell wrote.
“More ever Israeli military operations frequently cause civilian Palestinian deaths, often without effective accountability,” Borrell wrote.
“While Israelis can rely on a strong state and army, Palestinians have no such recourse,” he added.
Borrell called for Palestinians to renounce terror
Further down in the piece, Borrell called for the Palestinians to renounce terror, but he did not raise the issue of the monthly stipends the PA pays to terrorists and their families.
Borrell spoke of Hamas as a governing body and appeared to equate it with the PA and the Israeli government.
Cohen sharply attacked the article and expressed his “disgust” at the views expressed there, his office said.
It is “morally wrong” for Borrell to write about Hamas without explaining that its a terror organization, Cohen’s office said.
Cohen also raised the issue of Israeli concern about EU activities in Area C of the West Bank, including its support and financing of housing for Palestinians deemed by Israel to be illegal. The EU has also supported pro-Palestinian projects and non-governmental groups, including those supporting human rights and democracy.
“The intervention of the European Union in Israeli internal politics and the financing of Palestinian activities that encourage incitement and payments to terrorist families must stop,” Cohen said.
He had expressed the same sentiment when he spoke with Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani during the latter's visit to Jerusalem.