u/NorrisOBE

The initiative appears unlikely to gain traction.

The EU–Israel Association Agreement, which entered into force in 2000, underpins political dialogue and economic cooperation. The EU is Israel’s largest trading partner, with total trade in goods reaching €42.6 billion in 2024.

In September 2025, as Israel’s offensive in Gaza continued, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen proposed a partial suspension of the agreement, citing a “man-made famine” and “a clear attempt to undermine the two-state solution”.

The proposal has since stalled, with member states deeply divided. Countries including Germany, Hungary and the Czech Republic have opposed the move, preventing the formation of a qualified majority needed to adopt trade restrictions.

Diplomats told Euronews that, in recent meetings, several member states have reiterated their reluctance to move forward.

>In July, Uzbekistan-born, Russian-speaking Israeli writer Dina Rubina gave an interview to the Russian opposition channel Rain TV, which caused a stir in the Russophone world. During the hour-and-a-half programme, she declared that there are no “peaceful residents” in Gaza, Israel has the right to “cleanse Gaza and turn it into a parking lot”, and that Palestinians need to be “dissolved in hydrochloric acid”.

>This incident is not an aberration. Many in the Russian liberal opposition, which now operates mostly in exile, unquestioningly support Israel. This is not only due to their tendency to disregard institutionalised racism in Russia but also due to their embrace of a civilisational hierarchy narrative that places the white West at the top. Anti-Palestinian bias is a natural outcome of this worldview.

>Examples of the Russian opposition’s virulent anti-Palestinianism abound. Yuliya Latynina, a star columnist living in exile, has made parallels between “barbarians” destroying “blossoming civilisations” and the Palestinians and called students protesting against the genocide in Gaza “lazy and stupid”.

>Another self-exiled liberal commentator, Leonid Gozman, has claimed that European countries that voted at the United Nations in favour of a “pro-Hamas” resolution calling for a truce in Gaza did so because they were “afraid of their immigrant communities”.

>Andrei Pivovarov, former director of Open Russia, a now-defunct pro-democracy organisation, has said he finds Israel’s actions in Gaza “justified”. He was imprisoned in Russia until he was released last year in a prisoner exchange with the West.

>Russian opposition politician, Dmitri Gudkov, currently residing in Bulgaria, has declared: “For me, Israel is the embodiment of civilisation. Anything against it is barbarism.”

>Kseniya Larina, a renowned Russian journalist and radio host, also currently in exile, has hosted on her show Israeli Russian-speaking intellectuals multiple times. In one instance, a talk with an Israeli educator was titled, “Recognition of Palestine is not antisemitism, it’s idiocy”.

>These are just a few examples of the many Russian liberal emigres who openly supported Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. In addition, Russian pop icons, comedians, musicians, and TV personalities who are based in Israel or visit also constantly broadcast the Israeli narrative.

>The paradox here is that the Russian liberal opposition maintains that it is the democratic, moral alternative to President Vladimir Putin’s authoritarianism while openly expressing racist views against the Palestinians. It largely condemns Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and Russian war crimes, but denies the Israeli ones.

>In the West, the self-declared democratic values of the Russian opposition are rarely scrutinised. But they should be, because it is not just in relation to Palestine that its racist views are apparent.