Netanyahu waves off EU edict
JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would accept “no external dictates” on its borders after a European Union decision to restrict subsidies to organizations operating beyond Israel’s 1967 borders.
“I would expect that anyone for whom stability and peace in the region is really important to find time to discuss this issue after resolving more urgent problems such as the civil war in Syria and Iran’s race to achieve nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu said in a text message.
The European Commission, the union’s executive arm, said it will soon publish “guidelines” making good on a December pledge to deny EU funding to Israeli organizations in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Golan Heights.
“All Israeli entities whose place of establishment is within the green line will be considered eligible,” EU spokesman Maja Kocijancic said. The green line refers to Israel’s pre1967 borders.
The guidelines will cover central EU funding and won’t affect contracts between individual European governments and Israel, Kocijancic said.
Israel captured the three areas during the 1967 Middle East War with its Arab neighbors. It has since withdrawn troops and evacuated settlements in Gaza and annexed the Golan in a move that has not been recognized internationally. Israel says the fate of settlements in the West Bank must be resolved in peace negotiations.
The EU decision came before a visit to the region this week by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who is trying to revive peace talks that have been suspended since 2010.
Kerry arrived in Jordan on Tuesday on his sixth trip to the Middle East in as many months to push Israelis and Palestinians back into talks and to meet with Arab officials to discuss the upheaval in Egypt and Syria.
Kerry, who was in the region two weeks ago, claimed progress at that time in prodding Israelis and Palestinians toward renewed negotiations and in reaching agreement with Russia about an eventual peace conference on Syria’s civil war.
State Department officials downplayed expectations for this visit, portraying it as a chance for Kerry to make good on a pledge to keep Arab leaders updated. Information for this article was contributed by Gwen Ackerman of Bloomberg News.