European Union member states have agreed on new sanctions against Israeli settlers over violence targeting Palestinians, after a months-long deadlock, according to a top EU diplomat.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on the social media platform X that EU foreign ministers had approved the move.

The decision comes amid rising settler violence and settlement expansion in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

“It was high time we moved from deadlock to delivery,” Mr Kallas said.

The EU has yet to publish details of the individuals and entities to be targeted by the new sanctions.

French foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot said on X that the EU was sanctioning major Israeli organisations and their leaders over their support for the “extremist and violent colonisation of the West Bank”.

He said such “serious and intolerable” acts must stop immediately.

However, EU diplomats failed to agree on further measures, including a ban on products from Israeli settlements in the West Bank or the suspension of a key trade agreement with Israel.

Since 2023, more than 5,900 Palestinians have been displaced by settler violence, including about 2,000 this year alone, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.  

(Xinhua/NAN)