Van Dam: ’Council of Europe risks promoting terrorism over human rights’

Helsinki, 30 Mars, 2006 – The European Coalition for Israel condemns the recent decision by the Council of Europe to extend an invitation to the terrorist group Hamas to their next parliamentary assembly meeting in Strasbourg.

“This decision goes contrary to the fundamental objective of the Council of Europe which is to promote democracy and human rights, not terrorism”, said ECI Executive Director Rijk van Dam during a visit to Israel on Thursday.

The Council of Europe has justified its decision by saying that they want to provide a platform for dialogue between the newly elected Palestinian government, their Israeli counterparts and European parliamentarians. “Hamas has clearly stated that there is no need for dialogue since their sole objective is the destruction of the Jewish state,” said Van Dam.

“The decision to invite Hamas is an offense against all Israeli citizens and an affront to the international community which has strongly condemned Hamas as a terrorist group. When the Council of Europe recently debated the situation in Chechnya there were no representatives from the Chechan rebels,” van Dam noted.

The ECI is concerned that the invitation is evidence of a gradual softening towards Hamas at an official level within the EU despite the Islamic group's failure to meet Europe's basic criteria for dialogue; namely, the end of violence and recognition of the state of Israel. The Council of Europe decision also follows a similar invitation to a member of the Hamas-led government to attend the Euro-Med parliamentary assembly in Brussels, despite the organisation's presense on the EU terrorist blacklist.

Attempts by European Union officials to distinguish between Hamas itself and the invited Palestinian 'independent' who stood on the group's electoral list, are futile, said van Dam.

“There can be no distinction between Hamas members and others who are serving a government with the clear objective of the destruction of the Israeli state,” he said.

The European Coalition for Israel has repeatedly warned about the consequences of the Palestinian mismanagement of European funds which greatly contributed to the landslide victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections in January. Still ECI Director van Dam stressed that  “there can be no European funding to a terrorist led government.” In the meantime the Coalition is supporting a petition in Germany, the largest EU member state, urging Chancellor Angela Merkel not to engage in contact with Hamas.

According to ECI board member and co-initiator Harald Eckert, the campaign has taken off strongly. “ Now is the right time to make it publicly known that the German people will nont tolerate a regime which is seeking the destruction of the Jewish people”, he said.