Activities

• Seven branches in Europe with over 50 staff members.
• ECFR’s Middle East and North Africa program has “sought an invigorated European role in de-escalating crises and driving peace-building solutions in the MENA region during this period of unprecedented turmoil.”
• In November 2021, following the UK declaring Hamas a terrorist group, ECFR Policy Fellow Hugh Lovatt published an article stating that “A motion to label the entire Hamas movement as ‘terrorists’ is an attempt to score political points at the cost of a peacemaking strategy for Israel-Palestine.” 
• In December 2020, ECFR released “The end of Oslo: A new European strategy on Israel-Palestine,” claiming that “Israel has created a situation of egregious human rights violations and institutionalised discrimination that amounts to modern-day apartheid.”
• In April 2020, ECFR supported the decision by the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Fatou Bensouda to investigate alleged war crimes in the “State of Palestine” and called for EU member states to “defend the ICC’s impartial role” as a “full-scale investigation would provide a rare opportunity to address Israel’s 50-year occupation of Palestinian territory, as well as the climate of impunity surrounding the current Israeli leadership’s expansion of settlements and annexation of land.”
• In December 2019, the Jerusalem Post published an article exposing that ECFR accepts donations from donors who do business in the occupied territories of Western Sahara and Northern Cyprus, while pushing for the EU and European governments to adopt policies that promote silent boycott and divestment of any business activities supposedly related to Israeli “settlements built on occupied territory.” This reflects ECFR’s non-objective standards, which single out Israel while ignoring comparable conflict situations.
• In a May 2018 article, Hugh Lovatt placed sole blame on Israel for the continuation of the conflict, stating that “the disproportionate use of violence by Israel translates into greater Palestinian support for a return to armed resistance, or at least nurtures more nihilistic violence against Israelis.”
• On June 2, 2017, ECFR published a report, “Israel’s unlawfully prolonged occupation: consequences under an integrated legal framework,” authored by Valentina Azarova, a consultant with a history of anti-Israel activism, arguing that “third parties have an obligation to put an end to an occupier’s violations through collective and unilateral measures,” and called for the UN Security Council to “act in accordance with its authority under the UN Charter to determine that such acts are ‘crimes against peace’ which therefore constitute an international threat to peace and security” (emphasis added).
• On November 27, 2017, Lovatt and Azarova presented their reports at a European Parliament event, “Fifty Years of Occupation and Counting: Is it time for a new EU Policy on the Middle East Peace Process?” The conference featured politicians, academics, and NGO officials advocating Israel’s isolation, and calling on the EU and other countries to increase international pressure and to impose sanctions on Israel.

BDS Activities

• In October 2022, following reports that Booking.com would not add a warning notice only to its listings owned by Israelis in the West Bank, ECFR Policy Fellow Hugh Lovatt stated that “By continuing to list properties illegally built in Israeli settlements, these foreign businesses are implicating themselves and foreign tourists in Israel’s internationally unlawful actions and human rights abuses against Palestinians – all of which are subject to a war crimes investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC).”
• In November 2021, ECFR published an article by Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies international advocacy officer Maha Abdallah calling for “Effective differentiation measures and a ban on the sale of such products and services.” The article further called on the EU to enact “Restrictive measures…such as travel bans and freezing the assets of individuals involved in the unlawful appropriation and exploitation of land and resources, including businesspeople and settler leaders.” Abdallah urged the EU to “publicly warn companies and financial institutions about the legal consequences of activities with illegal settlements.”
• In February 2020, ECFR lobbied in support of the discriminatory UN database of businesses operating across the 1949 Armistice line, aimed at bolstering BDS campaigns against Israel. According to ECFR, “The report’s unveiling is itself an accomplishment, as it provides an important basis for promoting corporate accountability around the Israeli occupation.”
• Two ECFR researchers, Mattia Toaldo and Hugh Lovatt, write extensively on what they call the “differentiation” policy. In “EU Differentiation and Israeli settlements” (July 22, 2015) ECFR calls for sanctions against Israeli entities (and certain individuals) that have activities in or apparent financial contacts with Israeli settlements, claiming that this does not constitute BDS. The report lays the responsibility for failure to reach peace solely on Israel, ignoring Palestinian violence, incitement, and rejectionism. According to Toaldo and Lovatt, the EU should extend this policy to the business and sports sectors. They argue that these forms of “differentiation” reflect EU policy, whereas, in reality, the issue was specifically negotiated between Israeli and European senior officials (after the release of the EU’s “Guidelines” in 2013), and the EU clearly stated that it was not considering ECFR’s approach.
  • At a press conference promoting differentiation, then director of ECFR’s MENA division, Daniel Levy, who has extensive contacts with Israel-related officials and activists, stated: “I have no problem endorsing this. I would be not frank with you if I didn’t say my fingerprints are on here.”
  • The ECFR extended and intensified this campaign through multiple seminars and workshops with influential human rights NGOs, as well as publications in EU-based media and European foundations. These efforts were explained as necessary to highlight the claim that “continued settlement construction is illegal and an obstacle to peace.”
  • In January 2017, ECFR claimed that “The Security Council’s endorsement of the idea and practice of differentiation should be seen as a signal to Europe to redouble its own differentiation measures.”
• In December 2019, ECFR launched a “Differentiation Tracker” that includes a “detailed snapshot of European relations with Israel – and the extent to which these comply with UNSCR 2334 and the EU’s policy of differentiation.”
• On July 26, 2017, ECFR published a report, “Rethinking Oslo: How Europe can promote peace in Israel-Palestine,” authored by Hugh Lovatt and Omar Dajani, calling for “Deepening and broadening differentiation” as well as for “Imposing targeted sanctions upon persons or entities providing support to or benefitting from Israel’s unlawful practices in the OPT [Occupied Palestinian Territories], including its illegal annexation of Palestinian territory” (emphasis added).
• In June 2016, Hugh Lovatt, along with Martin Konecny from the European Middle East Project(EuMEP), endorsed sanctions against Israel, calling on FIFA “to exclude settlement clubs from the Israeli Football Association,” as part of a broader campaign against Israel initiated by several pro-BDS groups.” Lovatt stated that a ban would send a “very strong message” to Israel that it “cannot use football teams as a political tool to try to impose acceptance of its occupation.”
• In May 2015, Toaldo and Lovatt published “How to Revive EU Policy on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,” claiming that Israelis should be confronted with a future without European support since, according to the authors, progress in the peace process “depends…on Israel.” The report implies that only through sanctions on Israel can the peace process be resolved and presents the Palestinians as passive actors.
• In November 2015, Hugh Lovatt called for additional measures to punish and impose “real financial consequences for average Israelis who remain ambivalent about Israel’s settlement project.”
• In September 2015, Hugh Lovatt participated in a session by the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People titled, “International Meeting on the Question of Palestine: Israeli Settlements as an Obstacle to Peace – Possible Ways Forward.” The session focused on “the role of the international community, including regional organizations” and the “import of goods produced in Israeli settlements and EU guidelines.”

ECFR-MENA Employees

• The ECFR claims that MENA “researchers and analysts, including visiting fellows, has been drawn from government, research, advocacy, and media backgrounds.”
• Hugh Lovatt, ECFR Programme Coordinator for Israel/Palestine.
  • Following the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers in June 2014, Hugh Lovatt wrote that the “killing of the young settlers is a symptom of deeper issues caused by Israel’s policy of occupation.”
  • Lovatt’s Twitter account includes retweets of Ali Abunimah of Electronic Intifada, Al- Shabaka, Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP), and other pro-BDS activists and organizations.
• Former MENA programme director Daniel Levy is an activist involved in a variety of political advocacy NGOs and foundations.
  • Daniel Levy is the co-founder of EuMEP, a trustee of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, co-founder of J street, and former member of the board of directors of Molad-The Center for the Renewal of Democracy and the New Israel Fund (NIF).
  • Levy has referred to BDS as “a legitimate and non-violent form of protest against an illegal and inhumane policy of occupation,” adding that the proposition “that Israel will only respond to disincentives, that the occupation cease to be cost-free” is “worth testing.”
  • Following the call to demilitarize Gaza in 2014, Levy referred to it as a “red herring,” and stated that “the ‘reconstruction for demilitarisation’ formula is an illegitimate equation that continues to impose collective punishment on Gaza’s civilian population.”
• In an article originally published in Spanish, “Bibi and the Bomb,” another researcher,  Jose Ignacio Torreblanca portrays U.S. support for Israel as the only thing that prevents either peace or Israel’s isolation as an “apartheid” state. The article further asserts that “without the more than 3,000 million dollars that US contributors (including Obama voters) transfer annually for military assistance, the Israelis could not maintain a military advantage over their neighbours.”

2017-2020 Funding (partial list; amounts in UK pounds)