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Monday, 21 May, 2001, 13:23 GMT 14:23 UK
EU tries to ease Mid East tensions
![]() Irael attacked a Palestinian factory in Gaza with helicopter gunships
By diplomatic correspondent Barnaby Mason
The European Union's senior foreign policy envoy, Javier Solana, is on a tour of the Middle East to try to help stop what he called the appalling cycle of violence between Israelis and Palestinians. Mr Solana has met President Mubarak of Egypt, and will also be seeing Syrian, Jordanian and Lebanese leaders, as well as the Israelis and Palestinians themselves.
The European Union is a big economic player in the Middle East and has talked for years of taking on a political role in the Arab-Israeli conflict. EU envoys have made many tours of the region, but the impact is always greater when the French president or the British prime minister, for example, takes a hand. That, though, shows the lack of European unity. The former colonial powers have their own Middle East agendas, more or less independent of the United States. Chance for involvement Some EU governments saw the hands-off approach adopted by the Bush administration, after Bill Clinton's close-up involvement, as an opportunity for Europe to wield more influence, even to mediate between Israelis and Palestinians. But as the violence gets worse, Mr Solana's tour has at least as much to do with the need to show that the Europeans care and will do what they can. The one lever they have in theory is economic - they do a lot of trade with Israel and provide most of the aid to the Palestinian authority. International pressure But there is no sign of political will to use this leverage. When asked in Cairo about a possible EU economic boycott of Israel, Mr Solana said they wanted to be part of the solution, not of the problem.
Mr Solana was a member of the commission led by the former American Senator George Mitchell, whose report is published today. Britain has backed the report, and the New York Times says the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, will use it to make a new proposal to the two sides. Pressure is increasing on the United States to intervene, though Washington is not sure what to do either.
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