Official admits to Israel inability to stop international boycotts

The Tel Aviv regime cannot stop a growing international anti-Israel boycott campaign over the Israeli settlement activities on the occupied Palestinian territories, an official admits.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry official, whose name was not mentioned in the report, acknowledged on Sunday that Europe will continue to ban Israel as long as it presses ahead with its settlement activities on Palestinian land.

“We cannot truly fight against the will to boycott us,” said the official, adding, “There is no way to explain the fundamental issue that troubles even our most prominent companies in the world. It is impossible to face the subject of boycotts while not facing the subject of settlements. That is the truth.”

There is a “boycott fashion in Europe against Israel” and “as long as Israel continues to build, this phenomenon will persist and it will be difficult to prevent it without handling this political issue,” the Israeli official said.

The comments came after two of Europe’s biggest financial institutions boycotted transactions with Israeli companies involved in settlement construction on occupied Palestinian land.

The European Union has also blocked all grants and funding to any Israeli entity based in the illegal settlements.

The American Studies Association has also announced a decision to boycott Israeli institutions and academics over the discriminatory treatment of Palestinians.

Israelis are frustrated in the face of the boycott campaign. Cabinet ministers will hold a meeting next week in an attempt to find a strategy to counter the boycotts.

The presence and continued expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories has created a major obstacle for the efforts made to establish peace in the Middle East.

More than half a million Israelis live in over 120 illegal settlements built since Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds in 1967.