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EU Imposes New Sanctions on Israeli Settlers After Hungary Drops Opposition
"As a community founded on international law, the EU cannot be bystanders in the face of escalating violence and persistent breaches of international law," said one foreign minister.
May 11, 2026
Weeks after far-right Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán was voted out of office following 16 years of increasingly Christian nationalist rule, foreign ministers across the European Union agreed to impose new sanctions against Israeli settlers accused of violence against Palestinians—a move Orbán's government had been vehemently against.
"It was high time we move from deadlock to delivery. Extremism and violence carry consequences," said Kaja Kallas, high representative of the EU for foreign affairs.
Haaretz reported that the sanctions approved by the EU Council of Foreign Ministers will impact the Nachala movement and its leader, Daniela Weiss, who has made numerous statements advocating for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank; the Amana and Regavim organizations and their leaders; and the Shomer Yesha group and its former director, Avichai Svisah.
The groups and individuals will reportedly be banned from entering EU countries. They will also face asset freezes and be prohibited from engaging in financial activity in the EU.
Hungary's new prime minister, the socially conservative Peter Magyar, was sworn in to office over the weekend. He has said his government will not block sanctions that a number of other EU countries have been pushing to approve.
The sanctions announced Monday were first proposed in 2024, a year after Israel began its assault on Gaza in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack as it also ramped up attacks in the West Bank.
The far-right government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pushed for further annexation of the West Bank, with the prime minister signing an agreement to develop the E1 settlement last year, clearing the way to link thousands of illegal settlements together and cut off the West Bank from East Jerusalem—making a Palestinian state with the city as its capital impossible.
While the government has taken administrative steps to seize control of the territory, the Israel Defense Forces have increasingly aided settler groups in violent attacks on Palestinian communities. Last year, according to a report by the Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now, settlers and the IDF razed more than 1,500 Palestinian structures in the West Bank, double the annual average prior to 2023. More than 4,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from their homes in the territory.
One Israeli journalist last month called settler violence in the West Bank "ethnic cleansing" and spoke out against "intimidation tours" in which teenage settlers attack people in Palestinian villages while IDF soldiers either stand by or join in the attacks.
Tom Berendsen, foreign minister of the Netherlands, told reporters after meeting with the other EU officials that the sanctions targeted individuals "for whom a file has been compiled showing they have committed such violence."
Irish Foreign Minister Helen McEntee said in a post on social media that "extremist violence and persistent breaches of international law cannot go unanswered," and noted that Ireland has long pushed for the approval of the new package of sanctions.
Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir lobbed the familiar accusation of "antisemitism" at the EU foreign ministers and claimed the bloc had ignored attacks against Israel. Ten Hamas leaders were also named as targets of Monday's sanctions.
"The reflexive response that 'the world is against Israel' grows less credible every time allies impose consequences, like this move by the EU to sanction violent settler groups and extremists," said the US-based lobby group J Street, which calls itself "pro-Israel" and "pro-peace."
"This is not about delegitimizing Israel. It’s about what the Netanyahu government is enabling in the West Bank," said J Street, calling on Congress to pass a law to codify similar sanctions, which were canceled by President Donald Trump last year.
Officials in France and Sweden are calling for the EU go further than sanctions on individuals and groups by imposing restrictions on trade with settlements, and human rights groups in recent weeks have demanded a suspension of the EU-Israel Association Agreement to hold Israel accountable for its attacks on Gaza and the West Bank and its passage of a law requiring the death penalty for Palestinians found guilty of violent attacks on Israelis.
"We had discussions on the trade issues, limiting trade with the illegal Israeli settlements," Kallas said after the meeting. "There was a call by many member states to take this forward, so we will continue to work with the commission on presenting proposals."
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Despite Israeli Kidnapping, We Will Continue to Sail Boats to Gaza
Twenty-one boats were attacked by Israeli naval forces about 80 nautical miles west of the Greek island of Crete in international waters; 179 participants from 33 countries were taken against their will.
Apr 30, 2026
In the evening of Wednesday, April 29, 2026, Israeli naval forces attacked the Global Sumud Flotilla to Gaza. An unknown number of Israeli military ships went over 700 miles to attack a 54 ship flotilla that was headed for Gaza to attempt to break the illegal Israeli naval blockade of Gaza and bring worldwide attention to the continuing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, Israeli ethnic cleansing of the West Bank, the destruction and occupation of southern Lebanon and the attacks on Iran.
Twenty-one boats were attacked by Israeli naval forces about 80 nautical miles west of the Greek island of Crete in international waters; 179 participants from 33 countries were taken against their will from boats that were damaged by Israeli naval forces and put onto a commercial cargo ship that may arrive at the Israeli port of Ashdod around Saturday, May 2.
We anticipate that they will be processed at a dock facility in Ashdod, then transported to an Israeli prison and in three to five days deported from the country with a 10-100 year ban on returning to Israel, which means that one cannot get to the West Bank for actions in solidarity with Palestinians who are under attack by Zionist Israeli settlers who steal Palestinian land and animals and burn Palestinian houses and cars.
Fifteen US citizens were among the 179 that were kidnapped by Israeli forces.
As a US citizen in opposition to the US government complicity, no matter which political party is in power, in Israeli attacks on Gaza, I have been a part of the flotilla movement since 2010.
Thirty-two flotilla boats remain afloat, although many were damaged by Israeli naval forces and may be forced into ports on the large Greek island of Crete for repairs. No doubt the Israeli naval forces will be lurking like sharks in the waters off Crete waiting for the small boats to come out.
4 More Boats Are in Siracusa, Sicily, Italy
I am in Siracusa, Sicily, Italy with the Gaza Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) and its four boats, two of which came from the Thousand Madleens organization.
The FFC has been sailing boats to break the illegal Israeli naval blockade of Gaza since 2010 with over 35 boats sailed in the years from 2008-2025.
2025 Was a Remarkable Year for International Citizen Solidarity with Palestine
2025 was a remarkable year for international citizen solidarity with Palestine. In July the Madleen sailboat sailed to break the Siege of Gaza; followed by the 3,000+ person Global Sumud Land Convoy through Egypt, Libya, and Tunisa; followed by the FFC ship Handala sailing to break the blockade; followed by the large 42 boat Global Sumud Flotilla; followed by the FFC Conscience ship that sailed with eight boats of the “Thousand Madleens.”
Actions Against US Complicity in the Israeli Genocide of Gaza
As a US citizen in opposition to the US government complicity, no matter which political party is in power, in Israeli attacks on Gaza, I have been a part of the flotilla movement since 2010 as a participant on the flotilla that included the large ship Mavi Marmara on which Israeli soldiers killed 10 and wounded 50. All six ships in that flotilla were attacked by Israeli naval forces and participants assaulted, taken to Israel, imprisoned in Israel, and ultimately deported.
We will continue to sail boats until the genocide of Gaza ends and we break the illegal Israeli blockade of Gaza.
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IDF Soldiers Say Commanders Turning Blind Eye to Lebanon Looting 'On a Crazy Scale'
"It's not hidden," said one Israeli soldier. "Everyone sees it and understands."
Apr 23, 2026
While media coverage of Israel's war on Lebanon mainly focuses on the slaughter of hundreds of Lebanese civilians and destruction of entire villages, Israel Defense Forces commanders are tacitly condoning widespread looting by their troops in Lebanon, according to reporting Thursday.
Haaretz, Israel's oldest daily newspaper, interviewed a number of IDF personnel who described routine theft of items including motorcycles, televisions, paintings, sofas, and rugs from the homes and businesses of some of the more than 1 million Lebanese forcibly displaced by Israel's assault on its northern neighbor.
Israel has seized control of more than 50 villages in southern Lebanon as part of its expanding so-called “Yellow Line,” with residents who cross it risking their lives. Their absence offers IDF troops the opportunity to loot with no Lebanese resistance.
The looting of civilian homes and businesses is formally known as "pillage" and is strictly prohibited under numerous Israeli and international laws and conventions. However, according to the IDF soldiers and officers interviewed by Haaretz, senior and junior commanders know about the pillaging but are not punishing offending soldiers.
"It's on a crazy scale," one soldier said. "Anyone who takes something—televisions, cigarettes, tools, whatever—immediately puts it in their vehicle or leaves it off to the side, not inside the army base, but it's not hidden. Everyone sees it and understands."
Soldiers interviewed said commanders' responses range from turning a blind eye to prohibiting looting but not punishing offenders.
"In our unit, they don't even comment or get angry," one soldier claimed. "The battalion and brigade commanders know everything."
Another said that "battalion and brigade commanders do speak up and get angry, but without action, those are empty words."
Some IDF soldiers have even posted videos of their looting on social media—usually with no consequences.
🇮🇱🇱🇧IDF soldiers reportedly filmed looting homes in southern Lebanon.
The video shows troops taking belongings from civilian houses during the ground operations.
Israel’s campaign has displaced over 1 million Lebanese in under three weeks…pic.twitter.com/RRgjX8T9Rb https://t.co/iGcjA9NbXt
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) March 20, 2026
Responding to the Haartez report, the IDF claimed:
The military views any harm to civilian property and acts of looting with utmost severity and unequivocally prohibits them. Any allegation or suspicion of such acts is thoroughly examined and addressed with the full weight of the law. In cases where sufficient evidence is established, disciplinary and criminal measures are taken, including prosecution. The Military Police Corps conducts inspections at the northern border crossing as forces exit Lebanon.
However, some military police checkpoints along the border have been removed, and in some locations there have never been any checkpoints at all.
Widespread looting by IDF soldiers has previously been documented in Gaza and the illegally occupied West Bank, sometimes by the perpetrators themselves.
IDF looting has also been reported in Syria, where Israel has seized as many as 200 square miles of additional territory in 2024, including dozens of border villages, under cover of the Gaza genocide. Israel already conquered and occupied much of the Syrian Golan Heights in 1967.
Israeli forces also allegedly backed Palestinians who looted Gaza aid convoys in order to boost the narrative that it's Hamas, not Israel, thatof is preventing humanitarian aid from reaching starving Gazans.
Looting of Palestinian property was particularly rampant during the Nakba, or "catastrophe," when more than 750,000 Palestinian Arabs were ethnically cleansed to make way for the establishment of Israel.
The systematic theft of Palestinian land, homes, and property—which continued with the occupation of the West Bank, Gaza, and Golan Heights in 1967—is accelerating today, and can be witnessed in videos of settler pogroms in the West Bank and infamous footage of an American-born settler colonist telling a Palestinian family whose home he's trying to steal that "if I don't steal it, someone else is going to."
The ongoing apartheid in Jerusalem.
“Even if i get out of the house, it won’t be returned to u” pic.twitter.com/5sELdmClH5
— Abed 🕊️ (@tiredpali) May 1, 2021
Such unchecked usurpation emboldens further thievery. One soldier interviewed by Haaretz for Thursday's article said the pillage would effectively end if there were serious consequences for offenders, pointing to units in which commanders took a tough stance against looting, resulting in negligible levels of the crime.
"Lenient enforcement sends a clear message. If someone were dismissed or jailed, or if military police were stationed at the border, it would stop almost immediately," they said. "But when there is no punishment, the message is obvious."
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