Decision will ‘adversely affect’ relations between the countries and Oslo’s role in advancing Palestinian-Israeli relations, says Foreign Ministry.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Israel’s Foreign Ministry sharply criticized Saturday night the Norwegian decision to label all good coming from over the so-called “Green Line,” saying it would “adversely affect” relations between the countries.

“This is a decision that will not contribute to the promotion of Israeli-Palestinian relations,” the ministry said in a statement. “It will adversely affect the bilateral relations between Israel and Norway and impact the relevance of Norway’s role in the advancement of Israeli-Palestinian relations.”

Oslo announced Friday that it only recognizes Israel within the pre-June 1967 borders, and therefore all imports from the Golan Heights, Judea and Samaria, and eastern Jerusalem would be marked differently.

In its statement, the government cited a 2019 ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) that “the Food Information Regulation must be interpreted so that food from areas occupied by Israel must be labeled separately so that consumers are not misled by a lack of labeling about the origin of the products,” the government stated.

It mentioned specifically “wine, olive oil, fruit, vegetables and potatoes that come from the relevant areas.”

Although Norway is not a member of the EU and is not obligated by its court’s rulings, the statement mentioned that these specific foods are not included in the free trade agreement between Israel and European countries that includes the Scandinavian state.

Israel harshly criticized the ECJ ruling at the time as setting a “double standard” for the Jewish state when goods from dozens of other countries involved in territorial disputes were not included in the labeling decision.

Then-foreign minister Israel Katz said that it was “unacceptable both morally and in principle.” The former head of the Yesha (Judea and Samaria) Council, Yisrael Gantz, slammed it for “discriminat[ing] against Jews living and working in their homeland of thousands of years.”

Gantz also pointed out that “this decision will directly hurt the Arab population working at these factories, and manufacturing these products.”

Through Knesset laws, Israel declared its sovereignty over united Jerusalem immediately after the war, and over the Golan Heights in 1981.  Other than the United States, most countries refuse to recognize the change in status, deeming the areas “occupied,” or at best “disputed,” territories.

Norway says its decision is “in line with” UN Security Council resolutions as well as “assessments” by the International Court of Justice in The Hague that “the Israeli settlements in the occupied territories [are] contrary to international law.”

In 2020, the Norwegian parliament voted down a similar bill to label products from settlements in Judea and Samaria.

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‘By banning goods that originate in Israeli settlements, Europe would help support the differentiation between Israel per se and settlements in the occupied territories,” they wrote.

By World Israel News Staff

A letter signed by 13 prominent Israelis says that the European Court of Justice’s decision to mark goods produced from Judea and Samaria as ‘settlement products’ is not strict enough.

“We believe that accurate labeling of settlement products is an important step but is insufficient. We call upon the European Union to ban the import of Israeli settlement goods,” they wrote in a letter published by the Guardian on Friday.

“Israeli settlements are the leading cause of human rights violations against Palestinians, and settlement expansion is destroying the possibility of a two-state solution. By banning goods that originate in Israeli settlements, Europe would help support the differentiation between Israel per se and settlements in the occupied territories,” they wrote.

Among the signatories was Avraham Burg, a former speaker of the Knesset and former head of the Jewish Agency.

“Europe continues to support the occupation financially by allowing trade with Israeli settlements, which are illegal under international law. It should be clear that continuing to sell goods that support the erosion of democracy in Israel and the denying of rights to Palestinians is unacceptable,” they added.

Their call to ban settlement products entirely echoes what PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat said last Wednesday.

“Our demand is not only for the correct labeling reflecting the certificate of origin of products coming from illegal colonial settlements, but for the banning of those products from international markets,” he said.

The European Court of Justice ruled on Tuesday that E.U. countries must specifically identify imported products that are made in Israeli communities located in territory captured in the 1967 war.

“Foodstuffs originating in territories occupied by the State of Israel must bear the indication of their territory of origin, accompanied, where those foodstuffs come from a locality or a group of localities constituting an Israeli settlement within that territory, by the indication of that provenance,” the court said.

The letter was signed by:

Ilan Baruch, a former Israeli ambassador to South Africa

Eli Barnavi, a former Israeli ambassador to France

Michael Ben-Yair, a former attorney general of Israel

Erella Hadar, a former Israeli ambassador to the Czech Republic

David Harel, a 2004 Israel Prize recipient

Yehoshua Kolodny, a 2010 Israel Prize recipient

Miki Kratsman, a 2011 EMET Prize Laureate

Alex Levac, a 2005 Israel Prize recipient

Alon Liel, a former Israeli ambassador to Turkey

Mossi Raz a former member of the Knesset

David Shulman,  a 2016 Israel Prize recipient

Zeev Sternhell, a 2008 Israel Prize recipient

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The court decision “mandates religious discrimination, treating Jewish-owned and Muslim-owned businesses differently,” said The Lawfare Project.

By World Israel News Staff and AP

The European Union’s top court ruled Tuesday that E.U. countries must specifically identify imported products that are made in Israeli communities located in territory captured in the 1967 war, when the Jewish State had been surrounded by Arab armies amassing forces at its borders.

The European Court of Justice (ECJ) said that “foodstuffs originating in the territories occupied by the State of Israel must bear the indication of their territory of origin.”

The Luxembourg-based court said that when products come from an Israeli locality in such territory, their labeling must provide an “indication of that provenance” so that consumers can make “informed choices” when they shop.

Israel says the labeling is unfair and discriminatory and that other countries involved in disputes over land are not similarly sanctioned.

The E.U. wants any product made in these disputed areas to be easily identifiable to shoppers and insists that they should not carry the generic “Made in Israel” tag.

The Palestinians claim that Judea and Samaria, as well as eastern Jerusalem, should be part of their future state.

Today, nearly 700,000 Israelis live in the two areas, almost 10 percent of the country’s Jewish population.

The ECJ, in its ruling, argued that Israeli communities in these areas “give concrete expression to a policy of population transfer conducted by that State outside its territory, in violation of the rules of general international humanitarian law.”

It said any failure to identify the point of origin of produce meant that “consumers have no way of knowing, in the absence of any information capable of enlightening them in that respect, that a foodstuff comes from a locality or a set of localities constituting a settlement established in one of those territories in breach of the rules of international humanitarian law.”

Human Rights Watch welcomed the ruling.

The Lawfare Project condemned it, accusing the ECJ of issuing a decision that “mandates religious discrimination, treating Jewish-owned and Muslim-owned businesses differently even if they operate in the same geographic location.

“It also opens up a Pandora’s box of unintended consequences, allowing anyone to sue to add labeling requirements based on subjective ‘ethical considerations,'” says the Project, which refers to itself as the legal arm of the international Jewish community.

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The European Union’s Court of Justice ruled that Hamas is a terror group and should be put back on the EU terror list.  

The European Union’s (EU) top court ruled Wednesday that the Islamic Hamas terror group should stay on the EU terror list, saying a lower court should not have ordered the group removed from the EU’s terror list and sending the case back to the lower court for reconsideration.

The EU originally listed Hamas as a terror group in 2001, a move that froze assets of the organization in the EU. However the decision was annulled on procedural grounds by an EU court in 2014.

The EU appealed and Wednesday’s ruling by the European Court of Justice said that the 2014 annulment was wrong and must now be reconsidered taking into account arguments not ruled upon in the original decision. However, it added that Hamas funds will continue to be frozen pending the outcome of the reconsideration.

Neither Hamas nor Israel had an immediate reaction.

The European Jewish Congress welcomed the ruling.

The group’s president, Moshe Kantor, said it “sends a clear message that those who oppose peace in the Middle East by acts of murder and terror have no place within the European Union.”

By: AP

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