How to (Not) Walk the Talk: The Demand for Palestinian Self-Determination as a Challenge for the European Neighbourhood Policy

Abstract

The aim of the current article is to analyse the challenges for the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) to pursue a meaningful and effective policy toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on four dimensions: the history of European foreign policies toward the Middle East conflict, opportunities and constraints of realizing Palestinian self-determination, institutional opportunities and constraints for the ENP of walking the talk of an Israeli-Palestinian settlement, and policy options of the EU toward the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and their success conditions. The EU’s chances and constraints in addressing the Israeli–Palestinian conflict are discussed as structural challenges: the challenge created through the historical normative engagement of the EU, the problematic local conditions for constructively dealing with the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and the European institutional capabilities and their limits to project its policy concepts on the Middle East. The critical discussion of the three-faceted system of challenges that the EU is exposed to when dealing with the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is followed by the presentation and assessment of different policy options in the light of success conditions to (not) walk the talk of dealing with the Israeli–Palestinian conflict in a productive way. The article comes to the conclusion that the EU is hardly capable of contributing to the realization of Palestinian self-determination.