European Commission president José Manuel Barroso began the formal part of a
three-day trip to Israel and the Palestinian Authority with meetings in Ramallah
Sunday, where he expressed concern at settlement construction and warned against
ignoring the Israeli diplomatic process because of the upheavals in the
region.
At a joint press conference with PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad,
Barroso was quoted by AFP as saying that it was “important that the two parties
do not act in a way that undermines the viability of a twostate solution. In
this respect it is with concern that we see the continuous growth of settlements
in the West Bank, including east Jerusalem.”
Barroso, a former prime
minister of Portugal who is serving his second stint as European Commission
president and chairs the meetings of the EU’s 27 commissioners, called for the
rejuvenation of Israeli-Palestinian talks. He said that the changes in the
region should serve as an inducement – not a deterrent – to negotiations, and
added that the diplomatic process must not become “an orphan of the Arab
Spring.”
In addition to meeting Fayyad, Barroso also met with PA
President Mahmoud Abbas, inaugurated a new police training in Jericho and
visited the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem – which was recently added to
UNESCO’s World Heritage Sites under the classification “Palestine.” On Monday he
is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Knesset Speaker Reuven
Rivlin and President Shimon Peres. He will also visit Yad Vashem and the Israel
Museum. On Tuesday he will receive an honorary doctorate from Haifa
University.
In advance of Barroso’s visit, the Jerusalem-based NGO
Monitor called for greater EU scrutiny on large-scale projects it funds “for
highly politicized Israeli and Palestinian NGOs, and the absence of transparency
regarding this funding.”
“This is an opportune time for ending the
blatant lack of transparency – in violation of the EU’s own principles – and for
undertaking a detailed review, particularly for the NGO grants that end in June
and July 2012,” NGO Monitor president Gerald Steinberg wrote Barroso in a
letter.
He continued: “Rather than automatically renewing this funding,
the EU should carefully consider the implications of policies which secretly
provide millions of euros from taxpayer funds to Israeli and Palestinian
political NGOs. An independent examination of the EU’s funding for these NGOs,
including analysis of the procedures and impacts, if any, is long
overdue.”
NGO Monitor cited various EU-funded groups that it alleges
promote misguided human rights work. According to NGO Monitor, “The Israeli
Committee Against House Demolitions, which received 169,661 euros from the
European Commission [concluded June 2012], is a fringe political NGO that fuels
conflict by frequently accusing Israel of ‘apartheid’ and ‘ethnic cleansing.’
ICAHD officials are also active in promoting BDS [boycotts, divestment and
sanctions] campaigns, particularly in churches in Europe and North
America.”
In a related development, the Parliamentary Assembly of the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on Saturday rejected
a Palestinian application to join the 56- state organization as an observer, the
same status that Israel enjoys.
The Palestinian bid was turned down by a
vote of 28 to 21, with Turkey joining those voting against accepting the
Palestinian bid.
Diplomatic officials in Jerusalem, however, warned
against attributing too much significance to the vote, primarily because the
OSCE is not a UN organization. The officials also dismissed the notion that
Turkey’s vote could signal that Ankara was interested in thawing relations with
Israel, saying that a number of countries opposed the move on procedural grounds
– concerned that letting one non-state actor into the “club” would open the
gates for applications from many others.