Published on June 19, 2024 by Evert van Vlastuin on cne.news

After analysing the final results of the European elections, the European Coalition for Israel (ECI) expect the news EU Parliament to be more pro-Israel. The most Israel-friendly parties in the ECI’s research won the most, whilst the most critical parties lost.

While meeting with US partners and policy makers in New York and Washington DC last week, ECI Founding Director Tomas Sandell gave a first assessment of the vote’s consequences, he wrote on Tuesday in ECI’s newsletter.

In an interview with Yossi Lempkowicz from the European Jewish Press on Monday, Sandell stated that “the election result indicates that the new European Parliament has the potential of becoming more pro-Israel.”

His assessment is based on ECI’s Israel vote ranking, released in April before the EU elections on 6-9 June. The ranking revealed that those parties that gained more seats in the polls (European Conservatives and Reformists, ECR +7 and Identity & Democracy, ID +9 and European Peoples’ Party +14 seats) are also the most Israel-friendly in the European Parliament. The Greens, the Left, and the Liberals, which are more anti-Israel, suffered losses (Greens -19 and Liberal Renew -22 seats).

Still, Sandell is concerned by the radicalisation of Alternative for Germany (AfD). “But other far-right parties such as Brothers in Italy and Vox in Spain seem to be moving more towards the mainstream.”

In the EJP interview, Sandell said: “We should at least give them a chance and relate to them party by party, country by country, and not generalise.”

Notably, two EU experts showed themselves a bit more hesitant about the right-wing parties in Europe in an op-ed in The Jerusalem Post.

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