EU Prepares new Round Of Belarus Sanctions From June - Diplomats

The European Union is readying a fourth round of sanctions against senior Belarus officials in response to last year’s contested presidential election and could target as many as 50 people from June, four diplomats said.

Along with the United States, Britain and Canada, the EU has already imposed asset freezes and travel bans on almost 90 officials, including President Alexander Lukashenko, following an August election which opponents and the West say was rigged.

Despite a months-long crackdown on pro-democracy protesters by Lukashenko, the EU’s response has been narrower than during a previous period of sanctions between 2004 and 2015, when more than 200 people were blacklisted.

The crisis has pushed 66-year-old Lukashenko back towards traditional ally Russia, which along with Ukraine and NATO member states Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, borders Belarus.

Some Western diplomats say Moscow regards Belarus as a buffer zone against NATO and has propped up Lukashenko with loans and an offer of military support.

Poland and Lithuania, where opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya fled to after the election she says she won, have led the push for more sanctions amid frustration that the measures imposed so far have had little effect.

EU foreign ministers discussed Belarus on Monday and diplomats said many more of the bloc’s 27 members now supported further sanctions, but that Brussels needed to gather sufficient evidence to provide legally solid listings.

“We are working on the next sanctions package, which I hope will be adopted in the coming weeks,” said EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, who chaired the meeting.

The EU has sought to promote democracy and develop a market economy in Belarus, but, along with the United States, alleges that Lukashenko has remained in power by holding fraudulent elections, jailing opponents and muzzling the media.

Lukashenko, who along with Russia says the West is meddling in Belarus’ internal affairs, has sought to deflect the condemnation by imposing countersanctions on the EU and banning some EU officials from entering the country.

“The fourth package (of sanctions) is likely to come in groups (of individuals), but it will be a sizeable package,” one EU diplomat told Reuters.

More details were not immediately available.

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East Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah Becomes Emblem Of Palestinian Struggle

A putrid stench hangs over Sheikh Jarrah, a tiny neighbourhood of East Jerusalem where protesters are trying to prevent Israel evicting eight Palestinian families and letting Jews move in.

Over the past week, Israeli police have repeatedly fired a foul-smelling liquid known as skunk water that lingers through the night to try to disperse the demonstrators.

The standoff has seen violent clashes around the walled Old City and on Monday led to rocket fire by Gaza militants, drawing Israeli airstrikes on Gaza that health officials there said killed nine Palestinians.

It has also made Sheikh Jarrah an emblem of what Palestinians see as an Israeli campaign to force them out of East Jerusalem.

A tree-lined area of sandstone homes, foreign consulates and luxury hotels, Sheikh Jarrah lies about 500 metres (550 yards) from the Old City’s Damascus Gate.

It is named after a personal physician to Saladin, the Muslim conqueror who seized Jerusalem from the Crusaders in 1187.

Israel seized the Old City, and the rest of East Jerusalem and the adjacent West Bank, in a 1967 war. It sees all Jerusalem as its capital, including Sheikh Jarrah, which contains a site revered by religious Jews as the tomb of an ancient high priest.

Palestinians live in most of Sheikh Jarrah’s homes, but Israeli settlers have moved in to some of its properties, saying they were owned by Jews before the 1948 Israeli-Arab war that followed the end of the British Mandate for Palestine.

Nabil al-Kurd, 77, is among the Palestinians facing eviction from the neighbourhood’s Othman Ibn Affan street after a long legal battle.

“Israel will not be satisfied until it kicks me out of the house I’ve lived in almost my entire life,” he said.

Half of his house taken over by Israeli settlers after a legal battle in 2009. A wall now divides him and his family from the settlers, and his hopes of staying are pinned on Israel’s Supreme Court. read more

Israel’s government has played down any state involvement, portraying it as a real estate dispute between private parties.

On Monday, Arab Israeli lawmakers were among protesters, some of them chanting “Settlers out!”, who faced off with several ultra-nationalist Israeli politicians along Othman Ibn Affan street. Police kept them apart.

The Palestinians have lived in Sheikh Jarrah since they were re-housed there in the 1950s by Jordan after fleeing or being forced to abandon their homes in West Jerusalem and Haifa during the fighting around Israel’s creation in 1948.

The settlers who filed the lawsuit over Othman Ibn Affan street said they bought the land from two Jewish associations that purchased it at the end of the 19th century.

A lower Israeli court found in favour of the settlers under an Israeli law that allows Jews to reclaim ownership of property lost in 1948. No such law entitles Palestinians to do the same in West Jerusalem or other parts of Israel.

“Our families came here as refugees. It’s happening all over again,” said Sheikh Jarrah resident Khaled Hamad, 30.

At a settlers’ house across the street, an Israeli said the Supreme Court had rewarded Palestinians by delaying a hearing on the case as tensions rose.

“If anything they should have moved the ruling up,” said the settler, who gave his name only as Yaakov.

The United States is among critics of the evictions, raising the prospect of them becoming a diplomatic liability for Israel

Anti-eviction protests have been held in Palestinian cities across the West Bank and by Arab Israelis in Haifa and Nazareth.

Arab lawmaker Ahmad Tibi showed his support by coming to Othman Ibn Affan street. Support has poured out on social media.

Salem Barahmeh, a member of the Palestinian youth movement Generation for Democratic Renewal, said Sheikh Jarrah was “mobilising young Palestinians in Palestine and all over the world.”

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