Americans for Peace Now welcomes the statement issued by the European Union's foreign ministers, which states that no European agreements with Israel would be applicable in the Occupied Territories and reiterating the EU's policy of labeling products made in West Bank Israeli settlements.

Like our Israeli sister-organization, Shalom Achshav (Peace Now), APN supports making a clear distinction between sovereign Israel and the West Bank, which is under Israeli military occupation, and which -- together with the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem – in the context of an Israeli-Palestinian peace settlement, will become part of the Palestinian state. For a two-state solution to come into being, APN believes settlement expansion must stop, the settlement enterprise must be rolled back, and the occupation must end.

We join Peace Now in its criticism of the Israeli government's reaction to the EU's statement. As Peace Now points out, depicting the EU's policy as anti-Israeli or anti-Semitic is absurd. The EU's statement explicitly states that its policy "does not constitute a boycott of Israel, which the EU strongly opposes."

Furthermore, the EU invests billions of Euros in bolstering Israel's security and well-being, and just like the United States, its members believe that ending the occupation and establishing a Palestinian state living in peace and security next to Israel is a condition for Israel's long-term security and well-being as a democracy and a Jewish state. As Peace Now pointed out in a statement today: "Israel's friends internationally clarify again and again – 'we shall always stand by sovereign Israel, but we will never accept the occupation and the settlements in the West Bank and will not accept any solution that would perpetrate the continued rule over millions of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories.'"

For APN's past statements on this issue see here: https://peacenow.org/entry.php?id=15323

And here: https://archive.peacenow.org/entries/apn_joins_peace_nows_call_for_boycotting_settlements#.T_cgB5

 For more on APN's position regarding the use of measures to protest the settlements and the occupation see here: https://archive.peacenow.org/entries/bds_criticism_of_israel