EU warns Israel against 'divide and rule' policy

Brussels: The European Union warned Israel yesterday not to play "divide and rule" with the 27-nation bloc over the EU's new position that occupied Jerusalem should be the shared capital of Israel and a future Palestinian state.

The EU's adoption on Tuesday of the new resolution on occupied Jerusalem sparked an angry reaction from Israel, which captured the eastern half of the city in the 1967. It considers occupied Jerusalem its eternal undivided capital. Palestinians want occupied east Jerusalem as part of a future independent state.

"We have been very concerned by developments in [occupied] Jerusalem," Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, whose country holds the European Union's rotating presidency, told the European Parliament.

Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Wednesday that Sweden wanted to present the EU declaration as its achievement before that country's six-month term as the EU president ended.

"Sweden, which is completing its term as holder of the EU rotating presidency without any achievements or any significant returns, tried towards the end of its term to steal the show and steal the vote. That didn't succeed," Lieberman told Israel Radio.

Bildt shot back yesterday, saying that Israel should not "think that a relationship with Europe is divide and rule."

"You consider some [EU members] good and some bad and then you try to manoeuvre from that position," Bildt said.

Tuesday's decision demonstrated that the EU was a "cohesive and clear force" on global issues, including the Middle East, he said.

Bildt told lawmakers that the EU would meet today with representatives of the Palestinian National Authority, but that Israel has been unwilling to schedule a similar meeting.