The Justice for Palestine European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) reached one million signatures on Tuesday in three months. It is calling on the European Union to fully suspend the EU–Israel Association Agreement.
The petition accuses Israel of genocide, occupation, and apartheid against the Palestinian population, while calling for sanctions for its ongoing violations of international law and human rights.
Within the EU-Israel agreement, the EU has the right to withdraw in the event of widespread human rights violations. However, in practice, Brussels has rarely used this to sanction the Israeli government for its rights abuses.
Launched in January, the citizens' initiative seeks to gather momentum in Europe to effectively sanction Israel for its unconstrained and systemic violations of human rights in Palestine, especially during the Gaza war and its territorial expansion in the occupied West Bank.
With it having reached 1 million signatures, this legally obliges President von der Leyen to consider suspending the association agreement with Israel. It also surpassed the required national thresholds in 10 Member States – three more than the minimum of seven required under EU rules.
The grassroots initiative was put forward by the European Left Alliance (ELA), a European political party which sits with The Left group in the European Parliament, which includes members from Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
The initiative also brought together civil society organisations, Palestinian-led movements, collectives, and citizens across the EU.
EU sanctions to come?
The continued Israeli attacks on Lebanon have brought renewed urgency to calls for the EU to expedite the full suspension of its association agreement with Israel, the ELA says.
"Israel mass kills civilians, destroys vital infrastructure, and has recently passed a death penalty law targeting only Palestinian political prisoners, yet the EU rewards Israel by maintaining its privileged trade agreement,” MEP Catarina Martins, co-chair of the European Left Alliance, said.
This photo, taken with a mobile phone, shows people extinguishing a fire caused by Israeli airstrike in Beirut, Lebanon, on April 8, 2026. Credit: Belga
In September, the European Commission proposed to the European Council to suspend certain trade-related provisions of the agreement, as well as proposing sanctions on Hamas leaders, extremist Israeli government ministers and violent settlers.
The Commission also put on hold its bilateral support to Israel, except for support to civil society. However, these were blocked by Hungary in the European Council. According to reports, this is not expected to change.
Last week, the European Council, which includes all EU heads of state, called the approval of the Death Penalty Bill by the Israeli Parliament “a grave regression” and going against the country's own international commitments.
"We are deeply concerned about the de facto discriminatory character of the Bill," they said, alluding to the application of the death penalty only to Palestinians.
Non-EU countries like Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Moldova (Republic of), Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia and Ukraine also aligned themselves with this statement at the time.
