West Bank: 12 countries, including France, want to sanction Israeli colonies

International pressure is increasing against the settlement policy carried out by Israel in the occupied West Bank. Twelve countries are now demanding concrete trade measures against Israeli settlements, considered illegal under international law. The twelve signatory countries are: Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. They announce their intention to introduce national restrictions, support European measures against trade with the colonies or actively study such sanctions.

In their joint statement, the foreign ministers denounce an unprecedented level of violence committed by settlers as well as the continued acceleration of colonization. They warn in particular about the E1 project, which threatens to further fragment the West Bank and make the creation of a viable Palestinian state almost impossible.

But behind the diplomatic language, the reality is now difficult to hide: land confiscation, demolitions, expansion of settlements, de facto annexation, forced displacements, crimes, punitive expeditions and real pogroms against Palestinian villages. Day after day, the West Bank is fragmented, eroded and subjected to organized violence which accompanies an ever more assertive policy of dispossession.

After decades of condemnations without consequences, several Western states finally seem to admit that press releases are no longer enough. As long as colonization remains economically profitable and politically unpunished, why would Israel give it up? Banning colony products, sanctioning those who finance their expansion and cutting off the economic circuits that allow this policy to prosper now appears to be the minimum for states that claim to defend international law.