The European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, Friday, lamented no force, including that of the United States, can stop Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in his war on Gaza and Lebanon.
“What we are doing is putting all the diplomatic pressure to stop the fire, but no one seems to have the power to stop Netanyahu, neither in Gaza nor in the West Bank,” Borrell told reporters while attending the UN General Assembly.
Borrell backed a French and US initiative for a 21-day ceasefire in Lebanon that Israel has ignored as it intensifies its strikes on Hezbollah targets.
Borrell said Netanyahu had been clear that the Israelis would not stop until Hezbollah was destroyed, just as they have been in the nearly year-long war in Gaza against Hamas.
“If the interpretation of destruction is the same as what happened with Hamas, then we are going to a long war,” Borrell added.
US failure
The outgoing EU foreign policy chief again called for diversifying diplomatic efforts away from the United States, which has unsuccessfully tried to reach a truce in Gaza that would include the release of detainees.
He added that the United States cannot be relied upon alone to reach a ceasefire, as it has tried several times and failed to do so.
“I do not see that it is ready to start a new negotiation process that could lead to another Camp David,” he said, referring to the talks held at the US presidential resort in 2000, in which former President Bill Clinton unsuccessfully sought to broker a historic agreement to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Netanyahu pledged in a speech to the United Nations on Friday to achieve Israel’s goals against Hezbollah, which began launching attacks on Israel following Hamas’s attack on October 7.
Since Monday, the Israeli army has launched the most violent and extensive attack on Lebanon since the beginning of the confrontations with Hezbollah about a year ago, killing 726 people and wounding 2,173 others, while its war on Gaza has continued since October 7, leaving more than 137,000 Palestinians dead and wounded.
CrossFireArabia
