- The whole settlement project is sustained by EU imports worth €225 million a year while EU trade with Palestinians is only €15 million a year.
- Diplomatic pressure has no effect on Israel. To quote Likud minister Danny Danon: “The international community can say whatever they want and we can do whatever we want.”
- Stopping trade with illegal settlements is the only policy that is consistent with the UK’s declared policy of support for the state of Israel, but opposition to settlements.
- Stopping trade with illegal settlements will not affect the economy of Israel itself, only that of settlements that are not part of Israel.
- We are not asking for a boycott or a sanction to be imposed until certain conditions are met, but for a declaration that is wrong to trade with illegal settlements in all circumstances.
- Some international lawyers say we have an obligation to stop trading with illegal settlements. Other say we have the power (without breaking EU or GATT rules) rather than an obligation to do so. But all agree that settlements profit from the expropriation of Palestinian resources. By trading with settlements, we profit from Palestinian poverty.
Many Israelis agree with Ran Gidor, former political counsellor at the Israeli Embassy in London, who said in the Commons that settlements are “the single biggest mistake in Israel’s history” – a disaster for Palestinians but a disaster
Palestine Briefing 