BRUSSELS (AP) 鈥� The European Union reached a unanimous political agreement Monday to issue new sanctions on Hamas leaders and the Israeli settler movement, top European diplomats said, after years of deadlock and growing popular pressure sparked by the .
EU鈥檚 foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said in a social media post after a meeting in Brussels on Monday of the ‘s foreign ministers that extremism and violence should carry consequences. 鈥淚t was high time we move from deadlock to delivery,” she said.
The group failed to endorse even stronger measures pushed by some European governments and did not immediately release details of the new measures, but French Foreign Minister Jean-No毛l Barrot said the ministers had decided to sanction Hamas leaders and both leaders and organizations in the Israeli settler movement in the West Bank.
鈥淭he European Union is sanctioning today the main Israeli organizations guilty of supporting the extremist and violent colonization of the West Bank, as well as their leaders. These most serious and intolerable acts must cease without delay,鈥� he said in a post Monday on social media.
鈥淚t is sanctioning the main leaders of Hamas, responsible for the worst antisemitic massacre in our history since the Shoah during which 51 French people lost their lives, a terrorist movement that must imperatively be disarmed and excluded from any participation in the future of Palestine,” Barrot said.
Palestinians, rights groups and international observers are increasingly warning about the in the West Bank, where young Palestinian men are being killed with increasing regularity amid a broader climate of arson, vandalism and the displacement of farming communities near settlements and outposts in the occupied West Bank.
At least 40 Palestinians have been killed , according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, including a record 11 by settlers, two more than in all of 2025.
The unanimous EU vote is a sign of the political possibilities unleashed by the ouster last month of Hungarian Prime Minsiter Viktor Orb谩n after 16 years in power in Budapest. A staunch supporter of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Orb谩n had repeatedly vetoed earlier attempts to sanction Israeli settlers for actions in the West Bank.
But Orb谩n was defeated in an election in April by P茅ter Magyar, and the approval Monday of the new EU sanctions “validates the notion that Orb谩n was blocking them single-handedly,” said Martin Kone膷n媒, head of the Brussels-based European Middle East Project.
The sanctions could signal a turning point in the EU’s Israel policy. Criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government’s actions in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Iran had pushed many European governments, led by Spain, Ireland and the Netherlands, to seek such penalties.
鈥淵ou can鈥檛 just turn a blind eye,鈥� Luxembourg Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel said ahead of the meeting.
However, EU diplomats failed to agree on stronger actions to pressure Israel like banning products from Israeli settlements in the West Bank or suspending .
鈥淭here鈥檚 so much that you can and should be doing, and so to get stuck in this question of adding a few more settlers is missing the big picture,鈥� said Hugh Lovatt, a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. 鈥淭he EU鈥檚 narrowed the scope of action now to individuals and to a few entities, and in doing that it鈥檚 ignoring the far more systemic issues at play.”
Claudio Francavilla, Human Rights Watch associate EU director, said the sanctions were 鈥渁 step in the right direction, but so many more needed for the EU to comply with international law.鈥�
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said before the meeting in Brussels that his government needed more time to study a French-Swedish proposal to sever West Bank settlers from EU markets, effectively withholding support for the plan from Italy despite .
Individual nations could ban settlement goods on their own if the process stalls in Brussels, Dutch Foreign Minister Tom Berendsen said.
The EU’s next Foreign Affairs Council later in May will be focused on trade.
鈥淲e have been talking about measures for too long,鈥� said Spanish Foreign Minister Jos茅 Manuel Albares Bueno in Brussels. 鈥淟et鈥檚 move on to a vote and stop saying that there is no qualified majority for it. Let鈥檚 see how many of us are in agreement and who is not.鈥�
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