Israeli Press
Maariv reports Israel readies retaliation for Britain's settlement measures
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Israel is assembling "a basket of responses" to the package of measures on settlements that Britain intends to present within weeks, the Israeli daily Maariv reported on Wednesday, and a senior political official told the paper that "any British step will receive a response."
Anna Barsky, the paper's diplomatic correspondent, wrote that London's options include restricting or banning trade in goods from settlements in the occupied West Bank, a dispute Israel has fought with several European governments for years. Jerusalem would treat a trade restriction as a political act warranting reciprocal measures, the official said, without naming them.
The counter-bloc Israel is building#
The more consequential part of the report is the strategy around it. Israel is working to assemble what Barsky calls a counter-bloc inside the European Union to stop measures against it, and the official said "a double-digit number" of EU member states currently side with Israel on the main political disputes.
That effort runs through Central and Eastern Europe: the Baltic states, Moldova, the Balkans and EU candidates such as Montenegro. A companion Maariv piece the same day reported that the number of foreign embassies in Jerusalem is expected to rise from five to ten within about a month, and that Israel is expanding its diplomatic presence in Africa and the Balkans.
Barsky noted a precedent for restraint: Israel chose not to retaliate sharply against France over its recognition of Palestine, for broader diplomatic reasons, and the same calculation could shape the answer to Britain.
What is on the table in London#
This paper reported on 26 August that Britain was preparing a total trade ban on Israel's settlements. The Guardian called on Thursday for the government to ban all trade with them. Britain's foreign secretary said this week that "appalling" settler violence against Palestinians would draw a tough response, after the attack on Qusra.
Neither the British government nor the Israeli foreign ministry commented on Maariv's report. The decision in London is expected before the end of September, and Israel's answer, on the paper's account, is already drafted.
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