“In 2018, the Czech President Miloš Zeman promised in a speech on the 70th anniversary of the founding of Israel to do everything in his power to move the Czech embassy to Jerusalem. Last week, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš finally opened an official diplomatic office in the Holy City. “
“The official Czech Embassy still remains in Tel Aviv – but the nation has gone against EU policy by becoming the bloc’s second member to open an official diplomatic branch in Jerusalem. EU leaders have strongly warned member states against making this kind of move, fearing that recognising Jerusalem as the Israeli capital endangers the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.”
“But the Czech Republic is not the first EU member to open an official diplomatic branch in Jerusalem, with Hungary having already opened a new diplomatic office there in 2019. When Czech Prime Minister Babiš went to open the Czech Republic’s new Jerusalem office last week, he was accompanied by Orbán – ostensibly to discuss the success of the Israeli vaccine rollout, but also, perhaps, to underline a Central European concord on the status of Jerusalem.”
“The Czech Republic and Hungary banded together to veto an EU statement condemning the relocation of the US embassy to Jerusalem in 2017, as the bloc desperately tried to distance itself from Donald Trump’s incendiary move. Netanyahu clearly values the willingness of Czech and Hungarian leaders to disrupt European unity – both states were included in a list of countries intended to receive vaccines as gifts from Israel in late February.”
“Hungarian and Czech politicians see parallels between international criticism of Israel’s attitude in its conflict with Palestine, and criticism of the Visegrád region on contentious issues of national sovereignty, including migrant quotas and, in Hungary’s case, LGBT rights. Eurosceptics like Zeman and Orbán perceive their region as similarly misunderstood – and similarly threatened by external forces.”
“By opening embassy offices in Jerusalem, the Czech and Hungarian governments have rejected the careful line on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict taken by the EU.”
Read more: The growing alliance between Central Europe and Israel
2021-week21
