EU ministers discuss deal with Israel to increase Gaza aid
[July 15, 2025]
By SAM McNEIL
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union is seeking updates from Israel on
implementation of a new deal to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza,
according to Kaja Kallas, the bloc's foreign policy chief.
Foreign ministers from the EU's 27-member nations are meeting Tuesday in
Brussels in the wake of a new aid deal for Gaza largely forged by Kallas
and Israeli foreign minister Gideon Saar.
Saar met with EU leaders on Monday after agreeing last week allow
desperately needed food and fuel into the coastal enclave of 2.3 million
people who have endured more than 21 months of war.
“We have reached a common understanding with Israel to really improve
the situation on the ground, but it’s not about the paper, but actually
implementation of the paper," Kallas said before the meeting of the
Foreign Affairs Council.
“As long as it hasn’t really improved, then we haven’t all done enough,”
she said, before calling for a ceasefire.
Kallas said the ministers will also discuss Iran’s nuclear program,
concerns over developments in Georgia and Moldova, and new sanctions on
Russia. The EU is readying its 18th package of sanctions on Russia, with
holdouts within the bloc arguing over the keystone policy of capping oil
prices to cut into Moscow’s energy revenues.
European nations like Ireland, the Netherlands and Spain have
increasingly called for the EU's ties with Israel to be reassessed in
the wake of the war in Gaza.

A report by the European Commission found “ indications ” that Israel’s
actions in Gaza are violating human rights obligations in the agreement
governing its ties with the EU — but the block is divided over what to
do in response.
That public pressure over Israel's conduct in Gaza made the new
humanitarian deal possible even before a ceasefire, said Caspar Veldkamp,
the Dutch foreign minister. “That force of the 27 EU member states is
what I want to maintain now," he said.
“The humanitarian deal announced last week shows that the Association
Agreement review and use of EU leverage has worked," said one European
diplomat.
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Slovakia's State Secretary for Foreign and European Affairs Marek
Estok, left, talks with European Union foreign policy chief Kaja
Kallas during the EU foreign ministers meeting at the EU Council
building in Brussels, Tuesday, July 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden
Wijngaert)

Spain's Foreign Minister José Manual Albares Bueno said details of
the deal were still being discussed and that the EU would monitor
results to see if Israel is complying with those.
“We don’t know whether it we will know how it works,” he said. “It's
very clear that this agreement is not the end — we have to stop the
war."
The war began after Hamas attacked Israel in 2023, killing around
1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage, most of whom have been
released in earlier ceasefires. Israel responded with an offensive
that has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians, more than half of
them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The ministry, which is under Gaza’s Hamas-run government, doesn’t
differentiate between civilians and combatants. The U.N. and other
international organizations see its figures as the most reliable
statistics on war casualties.
The EU has observed some aid trucks entering Gaza, but “not enough,”
said Hajda Lahbib, the EU Commissioner for humanitarian air and
crisis management.
“The situation is still so dangerous, so violent, with strikes still
continuing on the ground, that our humanitarian partners cannot
operate. So, this is the reality we need to have a ceasefire," she
said.
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