STRASBOURG — MEPs on Thursday called for a “humanitarian pause” to provide food, water and medical aid to Palestinians in the besieged enclave of Gaza.
The Parliament called for a de-escalation of the conflict, a “humanitarian pause” and demanded Israel comply with international humanitarian law in its war against Hamas alongside the country’s right to self-defense. A humanitarian pause would allow for aid to enter Gaza through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.
In a resolution backed by 500 MEPs, EU lawmakers called for Hamas, which governs Gaza — and is listed as a terrorist group by the EU — to be “eliminated,” demanding also the unconditional release of the hostages taken to Gaza, who the Israeli army believes number 203, according to the BBC. MEPs overwhelmingly condemned the October 7 attacks which killed 1,400 people, as they did last week at a gathering in front of the Parliament in Brussels.
Israel has placed a complete siege on Gaza since the beginning of the war, refusing to allow fuel, water and food into the territory, which has been under land, sea and air blockade since Hamas took over in 2007.
The institution “is very concerned about the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip,” noting that roughly half the 2.2 million people in Gaza are children, stating Hamas is not the legitimate representative of the Palestinians. Israel has killed at least 3,785 Palestinians, including more than 1,500 children, in airstrikes since October 7, according to Gaza health officials quoted in the New York Times.
However, the resolution is merely symbolic as the EU Parliament has no formal role in setting the bloc’s foreign policy, which falls to EU heads of state and government and the bloc’s top diplomat Josep Borrell, who discussed the Middle East crisis Tuesday.
It could send a political signal that may help to settle the bloc’s stance after mixed messaging among EU institutions, a point made by MEPs themselves, whose resolution criticized the Commission and Council’s “uncoordinated” and “inconsistent” approach over the past 12 days.
Proposed by the centrist Renew Europe group, the call for a humanitarian pause won out over a call for an immediate ceasefire by the Greens and Left groups.
A small group of 21 lawmakers voted against the final compromise. Some far-left MEPs said they could not support the final text because it did not call for a ceasefire, merely a humanitarian pause, the most high-profile among them the co-chair of the Left, Manon Aubry, a French MEP. Twenty-four abstained.
Ursula von der Leyen, the German center-right Commission president, has sounded closer to unequivocally supporting Israel. Borrell, a Spanish Socialist, has put more emphasis on calling out Israeli actions, such as its siege and its demands that over a million Palestinians leave their homes in the north and move south.
“Condemning one tragedy shouldn’t prevent us speaking out against another,” Borrell told MEPs during a debate on the resolution Wednesday.
MEPs also called for an “independent investigation under international law” to establish whether the explosion at the al-Ahli hospital in Gaza that took hundreds of lives this week was a deliberate attack “and thus a war crime.”
Terry Reintke, a German lawmaker who co-chairs the Greens, spearheaded a late push to include strong language condemning rising antisemitic attacks in Europe, such as an attack on a synagogue in Berlin Wednesday.
Parliamentarians also called for a two-state solution, and for the EU’s foreign affairs department plus national capitals to put forward a “European initiative” to get peace talks up and running.
Despite not leading the bloc’s foreign policy, the Parliament has played a visible role in the unfolding crisis. MEPs gathered for a “solemn moment” to commemorate Israeli victims last week and MEPs paid tribute to families of hostages who were present in the hemicycle Wednesday.
Parliament President Roberta Metsola also visited Israel last week, saying she passed on the request to open humanitarian channels to Gaza.
