Though he is provided with a straw mat, Matthew says he prefers to sleep on the concrete floor of his cell in the maximum-security wing of Singapore’s Changi Prison.

“It’s more cooling that way,” says the 41-year-old former schoolteacher, who was sentenced to more than seven years in prison and seven strokes of the cane for selling methamphetamine.

In recent years, dozens of US states and countries ranging from Canada to Portugal have decriminalized marijuana.

But Singapore imposes a mandatory death penalty for people convicted of supplying certain amounts of illicit drugs – 15 grams (half an ounce) of heroin, 30 grams of cocaine, 250 grams of methamphetamine and 500 grams of cannabis.

A 64-year-old man was hanged for drug offenses this week – the fourth person to be hanged so far this year.

The harsh sentencing puts the wealthy city-state in a small club of countries that includes Iran, North Korea and Saudi Arabia, which execute criminals convicted of drug offenses.

K Shanmugam, Singapore’s Minister for Home Affairs and Law, characterizes the country’s war on drugs as an “existential battle,” and claims any easing of the government’s hardline stance could lead to chaos.

“Look around the world,” Shanmugam says. “Any time there has been a certain laxity in the approach to drugs, homicides go up. Killings, torture, kidnappings … that goes up.”

A lucrative drugs market

Visitors to Singapore get a stark warning about the island’s zero tolerance for drugs as international flights descend for landing.

“Drug trafficking may be punishable by death,” a woman’s voice announces over the loudspeaker, amid instructions to passengers to buckle seat belts and stow away tray tables.

Many citizens of this Southeast Asian city-state are also aware that it is illegal for them to consume drugs overseas.

Returning Singaporeans and permanent residents run the risk of facing drug tests upon arrival.

“When you come back, and if there is a reason to believe you have taken drugs, you could be tested,” Shanmugam says.

Per capita, Singapore is one of the world’s wealthiest countries. With a population of nearly 6 million people, it has an annual GDP per capita of nearly $134,000.

This regional transport and financial hub has a reputation for safety, efficiency and strictness under de facto single-party rule.

The People’s Action Party, of which Shanmugam is a member, has governed Singapore since its independence nearly six decades ago.

Speaking from a balcony in the Home Affairs Ministry overlooking tidy neighborhoods of parks and villas, Shanmugam argues his country is a potentially lucrative market in a part of Asia he says is awash with drugs.

“If you are able to traffic into Singapore, the street price here compared to the street price in some other parts [of the world], it’s a magnet.”

Singapore stands in relatively close proximity to the notorious Golden Triangle, the mountainous intersection of Thailand, Laos and civil war-torn Myanmar. Last year, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) labeled the region the world’s largest source of opium. Production of methamphetamine in the region has also surged in recent years, outpacing heroin and opium.

Singapore’s anti-drug czar claims strict punishment serves as a deterrent to drug traffickers.

“Our philosophy on prisons is not the same as, say, the Scandinavian philosophy,” Shanmugam says. “We choose to make it harsh,” he adds. “It is not a holiday home.

“It is intended to be tough.”

Single cells in stifling heat

Singapore’s Changi Prison Complex is a walled compound of guard towers and imposing gates built in the shadow of the country’s main airport.

More than 10,000 prisoners are held here, and according to the prison’s latest annual report, most are serving time for drug offenses.

A network of security cameras mounted inside and outside individual cells and even over toilets allow just five guards to monitor the entire floor.

At mealtimes, the metallic clang of shutting gates echoes through the cell block, as a prisoner distributes meal trays through a ground-level hatch at the bottom of each cell door.

His single-occupancy cell is austere, measuring just 7 square meters (75 square feet), with a squat toilet beneath a shower. Inmates are not allowed to have furniture, so there’s no bed or anything to sit on.

It is also steam-bath hot year-round in Singapore’s tropical climate, where maximum daily temperatures regularly rise above 30 degrees Celsius (86 Fahrenheit).

The effect of extreme heat on prisoners has become more of a concern around the world as temperatures rise due to climate change.

“You will notice that there aren’t any fans or aircon,” Matthew explains. “There are some periods of time where it’s unbearable.”

Asked whether the threat of the death penalty had any deterrent effect on his drug dealing, Matthew says, “I would like to say yes.”

“But the truth is at that point in time I wasn’t thinking about it. In fact, I was actively avoiding the whole issue of consequences.”

‘Captains of life’

The prison’s deliberately harsh conditions contrast sharply with abundant emotional wellness messaging in the facility’s common areas.

The workshop, where prisoners pack anti-dandruff shampoo and instant coffee for a small salary, is plastered with motivational quotes from luminaries such as Steve Jobs and Nelson Mandela.

Cartoon characters and photos of waterfalls decorate classrooms where prisoners get lessons in anger management and job training.

Officials from the Singapore Prison Service say they encourage guards to think of themselves as “Captains of Life,” helping rehabilitate the prison population.

From an air-conditioned room known as “the fish tank,” they monitor inmates on live feeds from dozens of security cameras positioned around the prison.

Reuben Leong, the officer in charge of the correctional unit, says the job is not without risk. Violent incidents – usually fights between inmates – take place every few weeks, he says.

“There will be periods of time where they can be demanding, they can be rude, they can be hostile to you,” he adds.

The Yellow Ribbon Project is a government program aimed at rehabilitating former convicts, with job placement and community engagement.

Despite these efforts, Singaporean officials say roughly one in five former prisoners will likely end up back behind bars within two years. By comparison, one in three return to prison within two years in the United States, which has some of the highest recidivism rates in the world.

Meanwhile, there is no rehabilitation for death row inmates.

Singapore executed 11 prisoners by hanging in 2022, and five last year, according to the latest figures. All were convicted of drug charges.

‘Give my son a second chance’

Outside the prison walls, relatives of death row inmates hold an agonizing vigil awaiting the fate of their loved ones.

Halinda binte Ismail has a shock of bleach blond hair and sports a small stud in her left nostril.

By her count, the 61-year-old has been in prison at least seven times, always for drugs. Halinda says she was just 12 when she first smoked heroin.

Her last arrest was in 2017, when police raided the building where she lived with her eldest son, Muhammed Izwan bin Borhan.

Both mother and son were convicted for narcotics. But while Halinda ended up serving five years, her son was sentenced to death after police caught him with six packets of meth and heroin, according to court documents.  He is still in prison, awaiting execution.

“I’m very angry with why the government doesn’t give [my son] a chance to change his life,” Halinda says.

“I always pray to the government ‘give my son a second chance.’”

Halinda is now part of a small movement of activists seeking to ban Singapore’s death penalty.

“It’s not solving anything, and it’s just disproportionately used against some of the most marginalized and weakest people in society,” says Kirsten Han, a journalist and activist with the Transformative Justice Collective, who lobbies on behalf of death row inmates.

“I just feel like it’s very morally wrong.”

Han’s outspoken criticism of Singapore’s system of executions has won her the personal enmity of Shanmugam, the Home Affairs minister.

However, Shanmugam confirms one of Han’s observations.

Among more than 40 inmates he says are currently on death row, most are in the “lower social-economic category.”

One of the 11 prisoners executed in 2022 for drug offenses was Nazeri bin Lajim.

“I was hoping that they [would] give him the life sentence, but they literally hanged my brother,” says his surviving sister Nazira.

Nazira says her brother was a life-long drug addict, but not a violent man.

She shows a series of portraits in her phone of Nazeri, dressed in a brightly printed T-shirt, smiling and holding up a victory sign for the camera.

Before each execution, authorities organize a professional photo shoot in which inmates trade their prison uniforms for civilian clothes.

Nazira doesn’t appreciate the gesture.

“It’s fake happiness,” she says.

She says she is encouraging her adult children to leave Singapore permanently to emigrate to Australia.

War on drugs

Singaporean officials point to surveys that show overwhelming public support for the government’s war on drugs.

In public appearances, Shanmugam often highlights public drug use on the streets of European and American cities to justify Singapore’s approach to the problem.

But it may be more fitting to compare Singapore’s record with Hong Kong, another former British colony that has a zero-tolerance approach to drugs.

Hong Kong’s population is around 25% larger than Singapore’s, and it does not impose the death penalty for drug offenses.

Yet despite its considerably larger population, Hong Kong made 3,406 drug arrests in 2023 – just a few hundred more than the 3,101 drug arrests in Singapore.

And according to Shanmugam, drug arrests in Singapore surged 10% in 2023 – suggesting that perhaps the threat of death is failing to act as a deterrent to crime.

“It’s a fight that you never say you’ve won,” Shanmugam says.

“It’s a continuous work in progress.”

With the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, many Israelis are sensing a window of opportunity to bring back the hostages still held in Gaza – and they are making their voices heard.

Huge crowds of protesters gathered across several cities in Israel on Saturday, demanding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government make the return of the hostages their top priority — something they believe has not been the case so far.

Sinwar was a hardliner with little interest in negotiating with Israel. The US, which mediated the talks in Cairo, has repeatedly accused him of being one of the main blockers of a ceasefire deal.

His demise could pave the way to a ceasefire agreement. But getting there will depend on Netanyahu.

The prime minister has long been trying to balance the demands of his far-right coalition partners, who seem dead-set on refusing any kind of deal with Hamas, with the increasingly loud calls from Israel’s Western allies, including the US, who are pressuring him to strike an agreement and bring the war in Gaza to an end.

Now he is once again facing large-scale protests calling for him to act.

“There’s a solid majority and a consensus in the Israeli society on this, 105 hostages have (already) been brought back in a deal,” he said, in a reference to the week-long ceasefire and hostage exchange that took place in November.

There are 101 hostages still held in Gaza, Israeli authorities say. As many as one-third of them are thought to be dead.

But Nissan said he believed Netanyahu’s government had a reason for prolonging the war.

“(A ceasefire) is not in their interest because they know that once the war is over, they will have to answer questions about how they were complicit in (the security failures that led to the) October 7 (attacks), and that there is going to be a national inquiry, and that there is going to be a demand for elections, and in any poll that you see right now, they’re going to be hit hard,” he said.

Netanyahu has not outlined any strategy on how to capitalize on Sinwar’s death, saying only that Israel will continue to fight “until the victory.”

“This is the beginning of the day after Hamas. Evil has suffered a heavy blow, but the task before us is not yet complete,” he said.

For Yoni Levy, the only victory would be the return of his daughter Naama from Gaza. She had been serving as a lookout, observing the Gaza Strip from the Nahal Oz military base, when Hamas stormed the area and kidnapped her.

Images of her being loaded onto a truck, barefoot and badly beaten, her gray sweatpants soaked in blood, became symbols of the brutality of the October 7 attack.

Yoni Levy said the death of Sinwar had given the government an opportunity to act.

“This is the time for the prime minister to take the deal, even if we need to stop the war for some time, even if we have to release some of the murderous people from their side, now is the time to take the extra steps which we did not agree to take before,” he said.

For Levy, this particular protest was special. Dozens of women, who had either known Naama or served in a similar military role as her, gathered at the square to call for her release. They wore the same clothes as Naama had on October 7 and used red paint on their bodies to symbolize the injuries she sustained in the attack.

The woman who came up with the idea, Amit Frid, said Naama should already “be home.”

When Hamas confirmed Sinwar’s death on Friday, the group said it would not free its remaining hostages until Israel ended the war, fully withdrew from Gaza, and released Palestinian prisoners. Similarly, Netanyahu too vowed to keep fighting.

But in a hint that he is willing to talk, shortly after Sinwar’s death was announced, Netanyahu made a direct offer to anyone holding hostages in Gaza, saying that whoever lay down their arms and returned hostages to Israel would be let go alive.

Shira Efron, a security expert from the Israel Policy Forum, said the window of opportunity to act could be small, given that Hamas would get a new formal leader soon.

“Terrorists tend to be pretty fungible. You always find new ones,” she said, adding that Sinwar’s younger brother Mohammed, a hardliner who is believed to be just as ruthless as Yahya, was among the top contenders.

She said that Israel needed to figure out quickly who to talk to – and provide avenues for those who wanted to reach out.

“Let’s just say that someone is convinced that this is the time to lay down their arms and give in, or provide information about a hostage in return for amnesty or a cash award, who do they even call now?,” she asked.

Some of the hostages may not even be held by Hamas, having been taken by other groups and individuals and it is these people that Israel is trying to appeal to now.

Over the weekend, the Israeli military began dropping leaflets featuring a photo of Sinwar’s lifeless body in Gaza promising free passage to anyone who helped to return the hostages.

Next to it, a call out: “Sinwar destroyed your lives … Hamas will not govern Gaza anymore. Finally, the opportunity has come for you to be liberated from its tyranny. Whoever lays down their weapon and returns the abductees to us, we will allow them to leave and live in peace.”

Britain’s King Charles and Queen Camilla met large, cheering crowds in Sydney after attending a church service on Sunday, the first event of their Australia tour.

The royal couple were greeted at St Thomas’ Anglican Church by the archbishop of Sydney, Kanishka Raffel, and children from the church’s Sunday school who waved Australian flags.

Camilla, wearing a pale green Anna Valentine dress and straw hat, was given a flower bouquet by the minister’s wife, Ellie Mantle, who asked if they had recovered from jet lag after the long flight to Australia on Friday. “Sort of,” Camilla replied.

Inside the church, Charles and Camilla signed two bibles, including one that belonged to Australia’s first minister and chaplain of the First Fleet of ships that took convicts from Britain to the penal colony of Australia in 1788.

Outside, the royal couple shook hands and chatted with families and cheering fans, some singing “God Save the King,” who lined the streets around the church, the public’s first opportunity to meet Charles and Camilla since they arrived in Australia’s biggest city on Friday night.

Traveling across Sydney Harbour, Charles visited the New South Wales parliament, marking the 200th anniversary of Australia’s oldest legislature.

The king presented the lawmakers with an hour glass to time their speeches, and highlighted the fundamental role of strong parliaments to democracy.

“What a great joy it is to come to Australia for the first time as sovereign and to renew a love of this country and its people which I have cherished for so long,” he said.

Charles is making his inaugural visit to an overseas realm as sovereign and his first major foreign trip since being diagnosed with cancer.

He will attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Samoa after the six-day Australia tour.

Charles had made a significant personal donation to create a skills program to tackle climate change and boost higher education in small island states, including the Pacific Islands, the Association of Commonwealth Universities said on Sunday.

“Throughout my life I have believed in the power of education to improve lives and unite communities across the Commonwealth and beyond,” he said in a statement.

Mid-career professionals and civil servants will benefit from the fellowships, in a program that aims to retain talent in small island states and bolster resilience to the impacts of climate change such as rising sea levels.

One year after his election victory sparked a rare round of relief and optimism among Europe’s establishment, Poland’s leader made a startling announcement.

Donald Tusk, a former European Union Council president whose longstanding ties to Brussels have cast him as both a savior and a scapegoat in Poland’s toxic political landscape, said on Saturday he planned to temporarily halt the right to claim asylum in Poland – adding he’d fight the EU on the matter if he needed to.

“It is our right and our duty to protect the Polish and European border. Its security will not be negotiated. With anyone,” Tusk wrote on social media, in language more typically associated with the authoritarian populist bloc he defeated one year ago this week.

The move, unleashed for maximum impact on that anniversary, came in response to an intractable crisis at the Polish border with Belarus, which Europe says is fueled by Russia. At the same time, it seemed to fly in the face of one of the EU’s founding principles – and Tusk’s uncompromising tone took Europe by surprise.

But perhaps it shouldn’t have. Increasingly, Europe’s centrist figureheads are dropping their once-high-minded rhetoric on irregular migration, reaching instead for positions that were previously the preserve of the continent’s populist rabble-rousers.

Border checks at all of Germany’s frontiers were introduced last month. France’s new interior minister has hinted that immigration curbs are imminent. Both countries have been unsettled in recent months by high-profile murders in which migrants were identified as suspects, and by a surge in support for far-right parties.

Across the continent, countries are looking with serious interest at Italy’s controversial new agreement to ship migrants to Albania, which began this week.

And while European leaders expressed a catalog of competing concerns about a tenuous EU migration pact during a summit in Brussels on Thursday, those advocating for a more welcoming approach – like Spain’s Pedro Sanchez – were conspicuously outnumbered.

Tusk has the political capital in Europe to push the issue, and is keenly aware that the question of illegal migration can sink a centrist government if ground is ceded to the far-right. French President Emmanuel Macron narrowly avoided that outcome this summer and Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz is slipping behind the far-right AfD in opinion polls.

In Poland, like in much of Europe, “voters across the board expect that border security and migration controls are the priority,” Kucharczyk said. “There is very little room for maneuver for any politician.”

A Russia-fueled crisis

But later that day, leaders instead expressed “solidarity” with Poland, and paved a path towards tougher bloc-wide measures, writing: “Exceptional situations require appropriate measures.”

The Belarus situation is certainly exceptional. Belarus has long been accused of encouraging migrants to reach the Polish border, at the behest of its ally Russia, in the hopes of exposing cracks in the EU’s border-free principles and common asylum system.

But Thursday’s victory for Tusk in Brussels underscores a broader, rightward shift across Europe on the issue of irregular migration. The continent’s new vocabulary includes concepts like external “return hubs” to which asylum seekers are sent – a fringe idea just two years ago that now holds serious weight.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and German Chancellor Scholz, as well as Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer – the continent’s centrist flagbearers, each at one time hailed as counterweights to anti-migrant populism – have scrambled over each other to emphasize the consideration and thought they are giving to Italy’s arrangement with Albania.

Its architect, Italy’s right-wing leader Giorgia Meloni, was expected to be something of an outcast on the European stage when she took office two years ago. Now, more and more leaders are sounding more and more like Meloni.

European arrivals are in fact coming down; there have been around 140,000 this year, compared to a seven-year high of around 275,000 last year.

But instability and displacement in the Middle East, the success of populist parties in virtually every part of the continent this year and a number of violent attacks allegedly committed by migrants – which have been quickly pounced upon by right-wing politicians, sometimes aided by a flow of misinformation – mean that the potency of the topic is only mounting.

Scholz looks on enviably as the far-right surges

Still, if Europe is heading in the same direction on illegal migration, it remains disunited.

A long-awaited new EU migration pact, aimed at sharing the burden of processing asylum claims more evenly across the bloc, has been picked apart from various angles by the 27 leaders. Some want it implemented sooner; others, including Tusk, have said they won’t accept relocated asylum seekers.

There is an evergreen issue at the heart of Europe’s latest divide; it is made up of 27 leaders who each have their own, domestic audiences at the front of their minds. But all of them have learned by now that public anger towards increasing legal and illegal migration is an indelible political force.

In Poland, Tusk is attempting to bend it towards his will. The veteran of centrist politics has banked some credit with voters one year after his election victory, but the populist Law and Justice (PiS) party he ousted last October remains a dangerous force, and its attacks on Tusk are primarily two-pronged: that he is a stooge of Brussels, and weak on the border.

There are caveats to Tusk’s plan. It is more targeted towards the Belarus border crisis than the initial language suggested; it is not immediate and its path to becoming law is tenuous. It is not entirely new – Finland has pursued a similar plan this year – and it is an escalation of, not a break with, Tusk’s stance on border security, which has always centered on efforts to repel the massing crowds in Belarus.

But tellingly, most of those details were missing from the prime minister’s initial announcement. “Tusk amplified the message (on asylum) on purpose to get attention,” Kucharczyk said. “The migration and security narrative was something that PiS has been using very successfully over the years; now Tusk has stolen it from them, and turned it against them.”

Tusk will hope this gambit sets the table for May’s election to succeed Poland’s PiS-aligned, veto-happy president – a contest that is absolutely pivotal to the government’s legislative hopes. “It’s an existential issue for this coalition, and they don’t want to take chances on issues like migration,” Kucharczyk said.

Scholz may be looking on enviably. Tusk has staked out a hardline position on the border before the issue tanks his popularity, but for the German leader, it may already be too late.

Scholz, whose SPD party is on course to lose power next year, has been slow to react to public anger, ignited most recently by a fatal stabbing in the western city of Solingen. The suspect was identified as a 26-year-old Syrian man with alleged links to ISIS, who had been due for deportation.

Days later, the AfD scored the first far-right state election victory in the country since the Nazi era – a breakthrough that spooked Europe.

That context informed Scholz’s sudden move to introduce checks at Germany’s western borders, in addition to checks that had already existed on its eastern flank. Hungary and Slovakia have made similar moves.

The wider question is whether the longstanding principles of the border-free Schengen Area can survive an enduring era of rising migration and populist subversion.

Its answer may depend, in part, on how successfully Europe’s current crop of centrists can take the fight on migration to their populist rivals – and whether they can maintain a reputation for moderation while doing so.

On that, Tusk seems willing to chart the course. But from the left, there are risks. “Tusk’s voters may applaud the security dimension (of his asylum plan),” Kucharczyk said. “But they will also want to see how (he) is different from the hard right.”

Israel has been on the receiving end of scathing criticism from European leaders who are trying to restrain the Jewish state from pressing on with its wars in Gaza and southern Lebanon.

From calls for a complete halt of weapons sales to Israel and considering sanctions on far-right Israeli ministers, to talks among EU members on reviewing Israel’s Association Agreement with the bloc, European leaders are trying to use their leverage to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu into negotiating ceasefires.

Adding impetus to their effort is the fact Israeli military strikes are now hitting UN peacekeeping bases in southern Lebanon, which house European troops.

The bloc’s position is starkly different to what experts described as unwavering support for Israel from European states on October 7 last year, when Hamas-led militants killed more than 1,200 people in Israel and took more than 250 others hostage.

But as Israel’s retaliation against Hamas morphed into what critics call a “forever war,” killing more than 42,000 people in Gaza, according to Gaza’s health ministry, European countries have sought to distance themselves from the Jewish state.

The rising European criticism comes as the United States appears either unable or unwilling to put significant pressure on Israel just weeks ahead of the presidential election in November, experts said.

“There is a lot of frustration, in western European capitals at least, with how the US has managed diplomacy over the last year,” Lovatt said, adding that some EU states felt the US should have done more to “moderate and constrain Israeli actions.”

Last weekend, the Biden administration sent a letter to the Israeli government demanding it act to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza within the next 30 days or risk violating US laws governing foreign military assistance.

In veiled criticism on Thursday, the European Union’s chief diplomat Josep Borrell said that too many people could die in that time.

“The US has been saying to Israel that they have to improve humanitarian support to Gaza, but they gave one month delay,” the EU foreign policy chief told reporters ahead of a leaders’ summit, according to Reuters. “One month delay at the current pace of people being killed. It’s too many people,” Borrell said.

Lebanon war ‘tipped things over the edge’

Relations were initially strained because of Israel’s assault in Gaza, Lovatt said, “which is seen by many European governments, including those who are still supportive of Israel, as having been disproportionate and in contradiction to international law.”

Israel’s ground operation against the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in southern Lebanon may have “tipped things over the edge” for many European states, Lovatt said. European reproach of Israel reached new levels when Israeli military strikes began hitting posts of the UN peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon. The mission, UNIFIL, has been stationed there since 1978 and is made up of 50 nationalities, including troops from Spain, Ireland, Italy and France.

Maya Sion-Tzidkiyahu, director of the Israel-Europe Relations Program at the Mitvim think tank in Jerusalem, said that “when it comes to defending their own soldiers,” European states tend to be more vocal.

The UN has said Israel’s military has fired on its peacekeepers multiple times in recent weeks, injuring more than a dozen. Israeli forces also forcibly entered a base, and stopped a critical logistical movement, the UN said.

Israel has said it has no intention of harming the UN’s peacekeeping forces in southern Lebanon but accused Hezbollah of using UNIFIL personnel as human shields. Netanyahu has warned that UN peacekeeping forces in Lebanon are in “harm’s way,” and called on UN Secretary-General António Guterres to get them out “immediately.”

The diplomatic spat between Israel and some European leaders burst into the open this week.

In remarks that drew a sharp response from Israel, French President Emmanuel Macron was quoted as saying in a cabinet meeting Tuesday that “Netanyahu must not forget that his country was created by a decision of the UN,” according to the Paris-based Agence France-Presse (AFP). Macron was referring to UN Resolution 181, known as the Partition Plan, which paved the way for Israel’s creation in 1948.

“Therefore, this is not the time to disregard the decisions of the UN,” Macron added, according to AFP. The French president had earlier called for the complete suspension of the sale to Israel of arms used in the war in Gaza, while stressing France has not been involved in their supply.

In a statement Tuesday, Netanyahu said that “it was not a UN decision… but the victory that was achieved in the War of Independence with the blood of our heroic fighters” that created the State of Israel, adding that many of those fighters “were Holocaust survivors, including from the Vichy regime in France.”

Netanyahu added that the UN has “in recent decades… approved hundreds of antisemitic decisions” against Israel, with the purpose of denying the Jewish state the “right to exist and its ability to defend itself.”

Israel has repeatedly accused the UN, and Guterres, of antisemitism and this week designated the UN chief as persona non grata and banned him from entering Israel. The EU’s Borrell condemned the decision, calling the accusations of antisemitism against Guterres “slanderous.”

The EU and UK consider Hamas a terrorist organization and have repeatedly condemned its actions since October 7. The EU has also sanctioned the military wing of Hezbollah.

‘We have blocked everything’

Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni also condemned Israel’s actions in Lebanon, including an Israeli military strike that hit a UN peacekeeping base where around 1,100 Italian troops are stationed.

“We defend Israel’s right to live in peace and security, but we reiterate the need for this to happen in compliance with international humanitarian law,” Meloni said Tuesday.

Italy is the third largest supplier of arms to Israel, providing the Jewish state with helicopters and guns, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). However, following the start of the war in Gaza, Italy suspended all new export licenses and canceled any agreements signed after October 7, Meloni was quoted as saying Tuesday by Italian state news agency ANSA.

This policy is “much more restrictive than that applied by our partners – France, Germany and United Kingdom,” Meloni said, according to ANSA. “We have blocked everything.”

Among the harshest critics of Israel have been the Irish and Spanish leaders, who have called on the EU to review its Association Agreement with Israel, saying the Jewish state is breaching the trade deal’s human rights clause in its Gaza war. Last week, Borrell said the issue would be discussed in the Foreign Affairs Council, as there is “enough evidence” to merit the discussion.

Changing the agreement would hurt Israel, Sion-Tzidkiyahu said, especially if trade is affected. The EU is Israel’s biggest trade partner, with trade between Israel and the bloc totaling $50.7 billion (€46.8 billion) in 2022, according to EU data.

In an earlier move that protested Israel’s war in Gaza, Spain, Ireland and Norway formally recognized Palestinian statehood in May. While no longer a member of the EU, Britain has also sought to restrain Israel’s behavior, most recently by considering sanctions on far-right Israeli ministers.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Wednesday that his government was “looking at” sanctions against Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

Meanwhile, David Cameron, who served as British foreign secretary under the previous government until July, told Sky News on Wednesday that he had planned to sanction the two ministers during his time in office, with the intention that it would show Israel that, while the UK supported the right to self-defense, “we do want you to try and obey humanitarian law.”

Both Ben Gvir and Smotrich rejected Starmer’s comments. Ben Gvir accused the UK of working to “prevent” the establishment of the Jewish state. “The British must realize that the days of the mandate are over,” Ben Gvir’s spokesperson said in a statement, referring to the British administration of Palestine between 1917 and 1947.

Last month, the UK suspended 30 of its 350 arms export licenses with Israel over risks of such weapons being used to commit serious violations of international humanitarian law. The decision was rebuked by Israeli officials.

German support

Experts said the EU is not a homogenous bloc, however, and its members have voiced varying degrees of criticism of Israel.

When it comes to Israel, Germany is often the exception to European policy. Berlin is the second-largest supplier of weapons to Israel after the US, contributing some 30% of Israel’s arms as of 2023. On Wednesday, the news agency DPA reported that, in the past eight weeks, the German government had approved military equipment and munitions exports to Israel worth €31 million ($33.7 million). That is more than twice as much as during the rest of the year, DPA said.

On Thursday, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said his country would continue supplying weapons to Israel.

German politicians have repeatedly stated that Israel’s security is Germany’s “reason of state.” This term is a reference to Germany’s special relationship with Israel due to its Nazi past, which saw the German state systematically murder 6 million Jews in the Holocaust. This genocide profoundly shaped the country’s policymaking.

Despite the recent tensions with the wider bloc, Sion-Tzidkiyahu said the EU’s relations with Israel “are still very strong” and remain “important to Israel.” They have not caused material harm yet, she said, but risk “taking away the legitimacy under Israel’s seat.”