Evolving Policies of the EU Towards Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Changing Actor Identities and Geostrategic Interests

Abstract

From the 1980s onwards, the EU took a balanced approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the last two decades, the EU has abandoned its role as a normative and neutral player. It appeared to address the Israeli-Palestinian conflict within the context of security. On this basis, the paper aims to assess changing policies of the EU towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since the early 1970s. By revisiting constructivist theories, the study attempts to find out the role of the identities in the EU's policies toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It concludes that the shift in the identities of the major political actors from the Palestine Liberation Organization to Hamas led to the reformulation of its policy toward Israeli-Palestinian conflict.