Israel destroys European aid projects, EU lets it be
Israeli settlers and soldiers target European aid projects in the West Bank. They destroyed Palestinian schools, hospitals and houses funded by the EU and Belgium. Our country played a leading role before and during its EU presidency to increase pressure on Israel. But for now, the EU is making little effort to recover taxpayers' money and stop the ongoing ethnic cleansing campaign. This is according to research by MO* journalist Pieter Stockmans who was recently in the area.
Translation of this article is provided by kompreno, using a combination of machine translation and human correction. More articles from MO* are included in kompreno‘s curation of the finest analysis, opinion & reporting — from all across Europe, translated into your language.
295,000 euros is the incomplete estimate of the damage. But since the Palestinian attack of 7 October 2023, Israeli settlers caused a multitude of damages that the West Bank Protection Consortium (WBPC) could not yet estimate.
The WBPC is a strategic partnership of the UK, EU Humanitarian Aid, 10 EU member states including Belgium, and five international NGOs led by Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).
Projects funded by the WBPC are actively opposed and demonised in Israeli media and politics. European diplomats and aid workers work in an unsafe situation. Israel does nothing to protect them.
Belgium major contributor
In 2023, Belgium contributed €1.25 million to the WBPC. Between 2015 and 2020, it totalled 6.3 million euros. 'After the EU Humanitarian Aid Office, Belgium is one of the largest donors to the WBPC. We appreciate its continued support,' said Allegra Pacheco, head of the WBPC.
Under Prime Minister Alexander De Croo (Open Vld) and Development Minister Caroline Gennez (Vooruit), Belgium always stood up for the WBPC and the needs of Palestinians within the EU. It is uncertain whether our country will continue to do so under a next government. Moreover, the strongly pro-Israeli Hungarian government takes over the EU presidency from 1 July.
In 2022, the Belgian foreign ministry had its humanitarian aid strategy reviewed. 'Despite the increase in settler violence, the WBPC is gradually realising its objective of preventing the forced expulsion of vulnerable Palestinians in the West Bank,' it sounded.
That was before 7 October 2023. But then settlers were given land, subsidies and weapons by the Israeli government to establish outposts near Palestinian farming villages, and attack and expel Palestinians from there.
‘Palestijnse en Europese initiatieven schieten wortel en brengen de voortzetting van de zionistische onderneming in gevaar. Er mag geen Palestijnse staat komen.’De Yesharaad, koepel van de Israëlische nederzettingen in de bezette Palestijnse gebieden
Only two settlers were administratively detained, none were charged. The Israeli government also expelled 2384 Palestinians itself in 2022 and 2023.
MO* witnessed total destruction in the vast mountains of the Jordan Valley and the Southern Hebron Hills. The destruction is part of a campaign by the Israeli government to evict as many Palestinians as possible from certain areas of the West Bank into surrounded ghettos. In this way, they want to 'make way' for new Jewish settlements.
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On its website, the Yesharaad, which represents Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories, explicitly targets the EU: 'Palestinian and European initiatives are taking root, thus jeopardising the continuation of the Zionist enterprise. There must be no Palestinian state. Palestinian Zones A and B must come under Jordanian control. Some Palestinians living in Zone C may be offered Israeli citizenship. If they do not want to live in Israel, they can live elsewhere.'
Zone C
The settlers and the current Israeli government want to annex the so-called Zone C to Israel with as few Palestinians in it as possible. The aim of European development cooperation is diametrically opposed to this. Instead, the WBPC supports the Palestinians to maintain the viability of a Palestinian state, including in Zone C.
The Oslo Accords of the 1990s temporarily gave Israel full control over this part of the West Bank. The 700,000 Jewish settlers living there are Israeli citizens like other Israelis. The 300,000 Palestinians are left to their own devices: the Palestinian Authority is forbidden to vouch for them and the Israeli occupation forces refuse virtually all building permits (98.6% between 2016 and 2018). If the Palestinians build anyway, a demolition order follows and Israel can send in the bulldozers at any time.
This is why the European Council decided in 2014 to recognise that Israeli occupation forces do not meet the social and economic rights of the local population, such as housing, water, sanitation, healthcare.
In de afgelopen tien jaar hielp de EU-vertegenwoordiging Palestijnse dorpen om 105 voorstellen voor ruimtelijke structuurplannen in te dienen bij de Israëlische autoriteiten. Die keurden geen enkele aanvraag goed.
Over the past 10 years, the EU representation helped Palestinian hamlets submit 105 proposals for spatial structure plans to the Israeli authorities. These did not approve a single application. The Israeli government then claimed that the WBPC and the EU were building 'illegal settlements'. And that the EU is 'taking a side in the dispute' by 'changing the demography of Israeli-controlled territory'.
That is exactly what Israel itself is doing. Moreover, the status of the West Bank is not a matter of dispute in the international legal system. As an occupying power, Israel has no sovereignty over the West Bank.
Regavim, a settler organisation founded by far-right minister Bezalel Smotrich, threatened the EU. 'If European governments understood that their money is in vain, they might stop funding,' Naomi Kahn of Regavim told The Irish Times. This is the motivation behind the destruction.
Israeli propaganda and sedition
The International Court of Justice ruled that the Israeli government must take urgent action against incitement, which on the ground could lead to genocide in Gaza. But it is also a daily reality in the West Bank. Regavim is an important link.
In pseudo-legal reports full of distortions of reality, Regavim portrays Palestinian farmers as 'the root of evil' and 'outposts of a Palestinian annexation of Jewish land'. EU-funded schools calls it 'a weapon to raise foreign donations and annex territory in Zone C'.
Regavim's website has a click system: 'Have you noticed illegal EU structures or other suspicious activities? Send us the details and we will investigate.'
For years, they portrayed the Israeli government as weak and meek. Thus, they also aroused mistrust among settlers against their own government. When the political parties behind Regavim joined the government, they felt they were seizing power.
After 7 October 2023, they added the message that Palestinian farmers were 'potential Hamas terrorists'. 'We are next, we live here unprotected against the Palestinian enemy,' it sounds in settlers' WhatsApp groups that MO* was able to see. Palestinian villages call them 'ten thousand bases to launch 7/10 attacks on Israelis'. They demand the immediate destruction of these villages.
The incited settlers were then drafted into the army as reservists and armed.
Settler attacks and demolitions by army
Since 2009, settlers and army destroyed at least 10,452 Palestinian properties in the West Bank (1717 of which were structures funded by international donors) and expelled 16,000 Palestinians.
In 2018, 36 Palestinian schools in Zone C (several funded by the WBPC) received demolition orders, threatening the education of 3708 pupils.
In 2022 and 2023, 1032 and 1352 Palestinians were displaced as a result of house demolitions by Israeli authorities, respectively.
In 2021, there was 1 settler attack per day, in 2022 2 per day, in 2023 (before 7 October) 3 per day. After 7 October, this rose to 5 per day. This is the highest daily average since the UN started keeping this data in 2006. In 2023 alone, there were 1229 settler attacks. Damage was caused in 913 attacks; 163 attacks resulted in deaths or injuries.
After 7 October 2023, settlers shot dead 12 Palestinians and injured 117. In half of the attacks, soldiers were present who simply watched or even helped the attackers.
After 7 October 2023, fewer official demolitions happened, but once more settler expulsions. 1208 Palestinians were expelled after 7 October (about as many as the previous two years combined).
In December 2023, official demolitions by the government suddenly went up again.
Palestinian deaths West Bank
Even before 7 October, 2023 was the deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the Israeli occupation.
From 7 October 2023 to February 2024, Israeli forces killed another 365 Palestinians and injured 4288 (the vast majority of them in incidents not involving any armed Palestinians). The UN speaks of "disproportionate and unlawful violence".
Expulsions and destruction of WBPC infrastructure
The WBPC supports 195 Palestinian communities and has already funded a total of 5,000 structures for Palestinians in Zone C. Most of these structures have received demolition orders from the Israeli government. MO* did not receive a complete list of all communities where the WBPC operates and where infrastructure was destroyed.
By 7 October 2023 (2022 and 2023), 10% of all structures funded by the WBPC had already been demolished and destroyed by government and settlers. Four communities had been displaced.
Since 7 October 2023, nine more communities had been displaced and even more funded structures destroyed or abandoned out of fear by residents.
The WBPC sent Belgium this figure: in September, October and November 2023, settlers caused 38,761 euros worth of damage in funded structures.
Throughout 2023, the Israeli government destroyed 83 funded structures, settlers 18. The estimated damage amounted to 295,000 euros. Much damage the WBPC could not yet evaluate.
Protection after destruction?
The purpose of the rule of law is to protect citizens from government abuse of power. Most legal systems also protect the right to property. As long as the occupation lasts, it is the Israeli occupation forces that are obliged to protect the right to property of the occupied population.
But Palestinian beneficiaries of WBPC donations have nowhere to assert their property rights if they become victims of settler violence.
Israel offers no legal protection. This is according to research by the Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din. Almost half of Palestinian victims of settler attacks do not file a complaint with the Israeli police because they do not trust them. Indeed, 92% of judicial files of Palestinians who did file complaints were dismissed without indictment between 2005 and 2021.
In the remaining 8% of cases where charges and prosecutions did follow, most perpetrators received only light sentences. Since 2005, convictions followed in only 3% of court cases.
‘We vragen compensatie aan Israël, maar er is geen manier om het af te dwingen behalve via sancties. En die worden geblokkeerd door bepaalde lidstaten.’EU-diplomaat
The EU does not provide legal protection either. European officials explained this to MO*. For example, if a funded school is destroyed, the procedure starts when the damage is measured. That is where things broke down after 7 October 2023. Until months after the destruction, neither WBPC staff nor the EU representation in the West Bank could go and measure the damage.
'Since the war, Israel has refused permits for diplomatic staff and aid agency staff to travel around,' said an anonymous source at the EU. 'We also need to convince our own security companies.'
Then the EU delegation in Tel Aviv contacts the Israeli occupation forces, sometimes the Israeli foreign ministry. 'We ask for compensation, but there is no way to enforce it except through courts and that is unlikely,' an EU diplomat informed us. 'Or through sanctions that would require the unanimity of all member states, which we don't have at the moment.'
In 2020, the Belgian government sought compensation from Israel for the destruction of houses in the Southern Hebron Hills. The buildings were built with Belgian money, as part of humanitarian aid implemented by the WBPC.
Israel refused to pay.
Sanctions against settlers?
The WBPC and the EU representation in the Palestinian territories have been sending information about settler violence from on the ground to EU institutions and member states for years. For example, the EU representatives already met Palestinian government employees being tortured by Israeli settlers, and saw footage of this torture.
Yet it took until 19 April 2024, four months after euro commissioner Josep Borell proposed it, for the European Council to place Jewish terror organisation Hilltop Youth, and settler leaders Neria Ben-Pazi and Yinon Levi on EU sanctions lists for involvement in torture and pogroms against Palestinian hamlets in Zone C. By then, most of the expulsions had already happened.
'Neria Ben Pazi (31) founded four of the most violent settlements in the West Bank in 2019,' the European regulation reads. And further: 'He is one of the main perpetrators of the forced displacement of the Bedouin community of Wadi Seeq near Ramallah. He is responsible for torture.'
On Levi, the regulation said: 'Yinon Levi (32) participated in several acts of violence against neighbouring villages from his home in the illegal agricultural settlement of Meitarim. These included storming and damaging homes of Palestinian families, inciting dogs against Palestinian shepherds while allowing his own herd to graze on their private land.'
'He is responsible for serious and widespread human rights violations directed against Palestinians' rights to physical and mental integrity, their right to property and their right to respect for private, family and family life.'
Their assets in the EU are frozen and they are banned from travelling to the EU. They are also banned from funding.
This affects the transnational funding network of Zionist foundations in the EU and the US, where the Biden administration previously took a similar measure. Even though the Israeli government had called on Israeli banks to ignore the sanctions, they followed them. Thus, the banks of Yinon Levi and other settlers on the sanctions list froze their private and business accounts.
By 19 April, the US was already up to the second round of sanctions. The Biden administration considered sanctions against ministers Ben-Gvir and Smotrich, for involvement in attacks on Palestinian civilians, but decided not to do so (yet). However, the possibility of doing it in the future remains open.
Still, Biden played a rather destructive role. In 2022, he removed the extremist settler organisation Kahane Chai from the US sanctions list "because it was no longer active". This allowed Kahane Chai to attract funding again. A year later, it was Minister Ben-Gvir, who was active within Kahane Chai, who armed settlers to expel Palestinians after October 7.
Czech Pirate Party helps Israel
The European decision had a lot of controversy. MO* learned that Josep Borell's cabinet is heavily frustrated with the drawn-out discussions among EU member states on sanctions against extremist settlers.
France spoke out in favour of sanctions in February 2023, but Belgium in particular played a leading role. 'At the informal council of development ministers on 9 September 2023, we raised settler violence,' says Belgian development minister Caroline Gennez (Forward). 'We asked for more reporting of the impact of the vandalism, and for the information to flow at the European level. But since 7 October, West Bank destruction has not been seen as a priority.'
Besides usual suspect Hungary, the Czech Republic also applied delaying mechanisms. The Czech Foreign Ministry gave the following explanation to MO*: 'What we are against is sanctions against Hamas and against Israeli settlers being linked together in one sanctions package. It is inappropriate to place a terrorist attack on the same level as the acts of individual settlers. We believe sanctions against individuals involved in terrorist attacks against Israel should be our priority.'
With this message, there are two problems.
With its demand for separate sanctions packages, which is of purely symbolic importance, the Czech government functions as Israel's advocate. After all, Israel considers it a PR disaster if it is equated with Hamas.
The Czech foreign minister Jan Lipavský belongs to the Czech Pirate Party, a party that nonetheless played a decisive role in the fight against the corrupt former prime minister Andrej Babiš at home, and belongs to the Green group in the European Parliament.
‘Die kolonisten en hun voorposten zijn er nog steeds. De oplossing is om de daders te verwijderen.’Allegra Pacheco, hoofd van het West Bank Protection Consortium
Moreover, the Israeli individuals and organisations that eventually made it to the sanctions list do have a terrorist past according to Israel's own legal system.
'Those settlers are still there,' says Allegra Pacheco of the WBPC. 'The solution is to remove the perpetrators of violence and close the outposts from which they plan and launch their attacks. The root of the problem is the settlers' continued illegal presence right next to or on land belonging to Palestinian communities.'
'We showed Belgian Foreign Minister Hadja Lahbib such a violent outpost during her visit to WBPC projects in the West Bank in late March.'
Israeli activist Arik Ascherman is preparing a lawsuit before the Israeli Supreme Court to have the violent Jewish outposts next to some Palestinian hamlets removed. He is consulting with the US embassy behind the scenes on the steps needed for the displaced Palestinians to return. That has still not happened. And it is questionable whether it will ever happen.
The WBPC still officially assumes that the expulsions are temporary and that the displaced will be able to return. For now, the displaced Palestinians are living in tents given to them by the WBPC. The cost of those tents will not be recovered from the perpetrators.
Sanctions against Israel?
The WBPC's objective of preventing the forced expulsion of vulnerable Palestinians in the West Bank is a political objective and implies Israel as the aggressor. But when Israel effectively acts as aggressor, the EU looks on helplessly. So is humanitarian aid to Palestinian farmers sustainable if it is not linked at EU level to political pressure on Israel?
'To Israel, Europe gives weapons, to the Palestinians simple shelters. Then protect those, at least,' says Azzam Nawaja of Susiya, where villagers have been struggling with settler violence for years. 'European governments should intervene and say: don't touch it, this is ours.'
Germany's example is most striking: through the WBPC, Germany supports Palestinians to 'make it easier to stay on their land', while it is the second-largest supplier of weapons to Israel, driving Palestinians off their land.
The EU could force Israel to apply international law - stop the expulsions, return and compensate already expelled Palestinians for damages suffered, and bring perpetrators to justice - by making arms deliveries to Israel conditional.
Indeed, great pressure will be needed on Israel because the state itself is involved in the expulsions. The Israeli government armed settlers, gave them agricultural subsidies to set up outpost farms right next to Palestinian targets, connected these outposts to the water and electricity grid, had the outposts protected by the army, and equipped settler organisations with drones to film and report on Palestinian construction and European aid projects in Zone C.
This framing allowed settlers to vandalise EU-funded projects.
'Settlers, the army and the government form one hand, a common project to expel Palestinians and take over more and more land in the West Bank,' said Sarit Michaeli of the Israeli human rights organisation B'Tselem.
EU representatives on the ground are fully aware of this. 'It is structural violence,' Minister Gennez also says. 'Often the Israeli army just stands there while the settlers do the destruction.'
The WPBC wants to be more than a band-aid, but for that it needs the support of EU member states and the entire European Commission.
Trade deal
The EU does have levers over Israel. For instance, there is the trade agreement between the EU and Israel. In February 2024, Ireland and Spain asked European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen to "urgently review Israel's compliance with its obligations under the trade agreement" due to Israeli violations of the law of war in Gaza. Indeed, the agreement stipulates that trade relations between the parties 'shall be based on respect for human rights and democratic principles'.
In April, the Belgian government announced that Belgium would take the lead at EU level to "re-evaluate" the trade agreement with Israel. It is far from certain whether Belgium will still do so under a new centre-right government.
'Je hebt sowieso al 27 potentiële veto’s rond de tafel, en via Hongarije zit eigenlijk Netanyahu zelf aan tafel, mét een vetorecht.’EU-medewerker in Brussel
Moreover, an EU official in Brussels immediately gave MO* a reality check: 'We all know this is not going to happen. Spain, Ireland and Belgium rightly want to make it as difficult as possible for Von der Leyen and member states to cover this up. But decision-making in EU foreign policy is done by unanimity. Any member state can veto it. For some member states, the human rights clause in the trade agreement means nothing. You have 27 potential vetoes around the table anyway, and through Hungary, Netanyahu himself is actually at the table, with veto power.'
The Belgian government had already asked the European Commission in June 2023 to draw up an inventory of all EU-Israel relations in terms of trade, development cooperation, diplomatic representation, academic cooperation and other relations. In other words, an overview of all the money pots Israel is part of.
'To know how to apply pressure, we need to know what levers we have,' Minister Gennez said of this. But the competent Eurocommissioner, Hungarian Olivier Varhelyi, shelved it. Until today, the Belgian government has not received this inventory.
Certainly after 7 October, the file on settler violence was no longer a priority due to the situation in Gaza. 'After 7 October, everyone fell over each other to support Israel, so this became a green light for Israel to do what it wants,' says Israeli activist Arik Ascherman. 'Until today, there is no decisive effort to stop the settlers' expulsion campaign, let alone work out a sustainable solution for Zone C.'
The search for ways to put pressure on Israel by giving less money turned into a situation where the EU would actually give more to Israel. Some EU commissioners and member states wanted to stop humanitarian aid to the Palestinians altogether, but in the end funding to the Palestinians could continue. But Israel would also get an extra €18 million in EU money.
Belgium was the only member state to vote against.
Sustainable solution
'Aid makes it easier for Palestinian residents to stay on their land, but is no substitute for durable solutions,' says the Norwegian Refugee Council, which coordinates the legal aspects of the WBPC, on its website.
What is that sustainable solution? 'Actually, we don't just want wipes,' says Ameer Dawood of the Palestinian government's documentation centre working with the WBPC. 'Palestinians in Zone C want self-government, a government that organises their social and economic rights, draws up spatial structure plans, grants building permits according to the needs of the population.'
'Now we are mopping the water up. Over the past 15 years, Israel barely issued 84 building permits to Palestinians, while over the same period it built more than 40,000 housing units in Jewish settlements in the same area.'
‘De hulp lenigt de dagelijkse humanitaire noden die door Israël worden gecreëerd, in plaats van de Palestijnen onafhankelijk te maken.’De Palestijnse juridische ngo Al Shabaka
Palestinian legal NGO Al Shabaka published a scathing report on the WBPC. 'The humanitarian aid Palestinians have received from international donors reinforces the status quo of Israeli territorial expansion,' it reads. 'The aid alleviates daily humanitarian needs created by Israel, rather than giving Palestinians independence or putting pressure on Israel to stop expulsions.'
An EU diplomat we spoke to anonymously disagrees with that analysis: 'So should our aid stop until EU member states put political pressure on Israel? I think countries like Hungary would be very happy with that. They want to protect 'our tax money' by simply stopping aid to the Palestinians altogether.'
Translation of this article is provided by kompreno, using a combination of machine translation and human correction. More articles from MO* are included in kompreno‘s curation of the finest analysis, opinion & reporting — from all across Europe, translated into your language.
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