Labels and Fables
While rockets from Gaza were flying above our heads last week, angry messages were flying from Jerusalem to Brussels. Not over the targeted killing of Islamic Jihad commander Bahaa Abu al-Ata but over the decision of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) that the EU’s labelling of Israeli settlement goods in European supermarkets was legally binding. All EU member states needed to label certain products from settlements in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, e.g. with a label that reads “Made in The West Bank - Israeli settlement” Speaker of the Knesset, Yuli Edelstein for example sent a letter to the President of the European Parliament David Sassoli, expressing his “dismay and disappointment” over the “disgraceful” decision. Edelstein’s letter contained most of the Netanyahu government’s standard arguments on this issue. The verdict “applies a double standard to Israel […] since out of “dozens of such areas around the world, […] only Judea, Samaria and the Go