The EU’s diplomacy has felt the weight of having basically the whole world against its double-standard application of international law and its own values and the accusations of being complicit in genocide and the brutal West Bank-Israel colonialism.
According to Haaretz, four Israeli settler entities (Amana, Nachala, Hashomer Yosh, and Regavim) and three related individuals (Daniella Weiss, Avichai Suissa, and Meir Deutsch) are to be placed under an EU visa ban and asset freeze.
Why is it a farce?
The farce consists of making a look-alike of some action taken vis-à-vis such an enormous issue and saving face. The EU diplomats should be enlightened enough to know that what is going on in the West Bank is not an individual initiative in which individuals are punished; rather, it is a state policy.
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich, and the Israeli army (IDF) actively participate in motivating such actions and in defending, as personal militia, the criminal colonialists while they are perpetrating their crimes with no condemnation, as documented in hundreds of reports and footage. These two right-ranked political figures are considered the masterminds behind the crimes.
What is the settlers’ crime?
Foucault enlightened us that words have power and therefore matter. The EU leadership and member states’ leaders have classified the crimes in different tones, such as “attacks on Palestinians” (Kaja Kallas, EU Foreign Affairs boss), “extremist and violent colonisation of the West Bank,” and “these most serious and intolerable acts must cease without delay” (Jean-Noël Barrot, French Foreign Affairs Minister). Or, as gently put by Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen, “Both Gaza and the West Bank have been quite worrying over the past months.”
The settlers’ crime? Just one example of last weekend (Friday and Saturday, 8-9 May, 2026): the Haaretz reported that several Palestinians were wounded as Israeli settlers launched 20 attacks in the West Bank over the weekend, including home invasions, arson, stone-throwing, and field damage, wounding several people. No action from the army.
Different organizations are involved in denouncing the atrocities going on in the West Bank, such as Amnesty International and Middle East Eye, but little attention is given. According to Le Monde, violence is the main tactic of the Israeli settlers to annex Palestinian land.
Arson is the preferred criminal action among the settlers. They set fire to Palestinian plantations, including hundred-year-old olive trees, cattle and sheep, cars, houses, and entire villages, ran over by car on purpose of pedestrian Palestinians, assaulted farmers, raided schools, or opened fire on a Palestinian school, where two boys were killed by the settlers. Witnesses say settlers, some in army-style uniforms, and accompanied by soldiers, fired live ammunition at students and residents in al-Mughayyir village.
Other actions are blocking Palestinian children from going to school, or playing soccer, blocking roads and passages, besieging an entire village, destroying Palestinian shops, and weaponizing water. Meanwhile, Israeli boys are trained to be new settlers using violence.
Barry Andrews, a senior MEP who visited the West Bank last week, stated, “Land grabs, ethnic cleansing, and killings have only increased. The EU cannot stand idly by. […] EU Foreign Ministers must agree, at a minimum, on new sanctions on settlers. But ultimately, only a review of the EU-Israel Association Agreement will have an impact.”
Trade with the settlements and the EU-Israel Association Agreement remain intact – business as usual, pretending no genocide, apartheid, or brutal colonialism has or still is happening. After all, if trade is banned, the lifeline of the settlements is also gone. This does not seem to be the EU’s intention, as Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, and Smotrich would not be happy. Meanwhile, as put by Mondoweiss, “Israel is racing to expand West Bank settlements before new political realities end its era of impunity.”
Ricardo Martins – Doctor of Sociology, specialist in European and international politics as well as geopolitics
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