The EU is Israel’s largest trading partner, accounting for 32 percent of its total trade in 2024, so any possible suspension will have a major effect on the Israeli economy. The EU exports machinery and transport equipment, chemicals and other manufactured goods to Israel, with total exports amounting to €26.7 billion in 2024.
A question of credibility
A suspension would not amount to targeted sanctions or an EU-wide arms embargo — steps that civil society and some member countries have also called for to exert economic pressure on Israel — but would instead reimpose tariffs.
According to Ignacio García Bercero, a former Commission trade civil servant, suspending preferential tariffs under the agreement would be “the minimum that one could do.” Bercero argued that this is a “fundamental question of credibility of [EU] human rights policy.”
The former chief negotiator on the EU’s trade deals with India and Korea, Bercero, also recommended that the EU prohibit trade with illegal settlements, bringing it into line with an International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling in 2024. Belgium and eight other member states have already formally asked the Commission to review its policy on trade with Israeli settlements.
Still, reaching a qualified majority to suspend the trade deal won’t be easy, either. While a majority of countries voted in favor of reviewing the deal, that doesn’t mean all of them will vote in favor of suspending it. Moreover, large countries critical of the review — such as Italy and Germany — would need to support the suspension. And close Israel allies such as Hungary, Czechia, Austria and Poland are also unlikely to waver in their support.
What’s more, it’s not obvious that a qualified majority is sufficient in this case, said Bartels, the Cambridge professor.