Arming instability: EU-Israel arms trade and the EU Common Position. CEPS Policy Brief 28 Jul 2020.

Machiarini Crosson , Dylan (2020) Arming instability: EU-Israel arms trade and the EU Common Position. CEPS Policy Brief 28 Jul 2020. [Policy Paper]

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Abstract

Arms transfers have implications for the Middle East Peace process and the EU’s preference for a two-state solution, but they only seem to grab headlines when tensions flare up and Israel adopts a more proactive security stance towards Palestinians and the status of the occupied territories. The export of arms is a topic that bridges trade and the Common Foreign and Security Policy, and the EU is a major source of Israel’s arms imports and an important destination for its high-tech and highly integrated defence industry. The EU could therefore leverage its arms exports control regime as a dissuasive foreign policy tool or, at worst, in response to Israeli annexation, as requested by 11 EU member states. But for the EU’s arms export control regime to become a permanent and reliable CFSP tool, member states must also show political courage and agree to update its legal framework. This policy brief outlines how to increase the political and economic cost of the Israeli government’s plans to annex parts of the West Bank, along with proposals for how to improve the EU’s arms export control regime.

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