The Brussels City Council unanimously passed a motion on Monday evening to block public procurement of products from Israeli settlements in the West Bank, with the MR and N-VA parties abstaining.
The PTB party, which backed the majority motion, had proposed a motion to sever both economic and political ties until Israel “complies with international law.”
The council presented a more city-focused text, concerning its public procurement which incurs around €70 million in annual expenses for the capital’s central municipality.
Does it actually change something? The Brussels city is procuring that many goods from israeli settlements in the west bank? That wouldn’t make a dent even if it was a country-wide ban on all imports
It’s a good start. These things are how we get real action against Israel. Doubly so given that Israel’s main economic partners are America and the EU (they can’t trade with their neighbors for obvious reasons).
Iirc EU countries are not supposed to import goods from the settlements anyway, same with from Moroccan occupied West Sahara. But those companies arent exactly transparent and will simply slap a sticker on their product saying “made in Israel/Morocco”.
Is that the case? AFAIK it’s simply that they need to label them as made in settlements and most people don’t want to buy or stock Israeli settlement products.
they have trade agreements with both egypt and jordan.
and both jordan and mainly egypt import a lot of gas from israel, while jordan also imports a lot of water.
Okay as an Egyptian this is my first time hearing about this. Let’s make that “can’t trade much with their neighbors”.
It’s definitely not a major player but the ball has to start rolling somewhere. Brussels breaking the ice is a start.
Nothing much. This isn’t actually the government of Brussels, but just one municipality in the city, the centre bit.
Basically it’s a bit like if the government in Islington (London) decided to stop buying stuff from Israel, except Islington has a larger population than the City of Brussels.