EU High Representative Josep Borrell reroutes his final Mideast tour to Cyprus after consultation with ALLMEP to meet with a pre-planned gathering of peace NGO executives, and unveils his legacy principles for conflict resolution at a high-impact event that ALLMEP helped its hosts produce.

By Brian Reeves

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How far must one go to get a global leader to highlight the necessity of supporting Palestinian and Israeli peacebuilders, to solidify this governmental support, to give said peacebuilders an exclusive platform to speak truth to power, and to promote camaraderie and synergies with fellow peace actors along the way? Turns out it’s a one-hour plane ride.

In his final planned tour of the Middle East as the EU’s “foreign minister,” High Representative Josep Borrell sought to unveil his legacy principles for his successor on how best the EU could promote a tangible path toward Israeli-Palestinian conflict resolution after the most egregiously disastrous year in memory. ALLMEP had just convinced his cabinet of the need to meet with peacebuilders—a gesture that would underscore the commitment the G7 made in June on the need to coordinate, institutionalize, and embed support for civil society peacebuilding within the broader international strategy to tackle the roots of the hatred and to promote gainful cooperation between societies alongside a genuine diplomatic initiative for an equitable, conflict-ending final status settlem

ent. There was just one problem: between lack of permits, security concerns, and anti-normalization sentiment threatening businesses once used for gatherings, convening Israelis and Palestinians in one room has become logistically almost impossible since the October 7 attacks and the Gaza war.

Rather than bother a bunch of overworked peacebuilding leaders to jump through hoops to create an inaccurate image of peacebuilding work in the present wartime reality, ALLMEP made another offer to the team of the top EU diplomat: add a trip to Cyprus, where a similar gathering of peacebuilders was already set to take place.

Such was how ALLMEP’s partners at the Geneva Initiative and Palestinian Peace Coalition found themselves with a spare world dignitary to top off an already impactful three-day summit of the Two-State Coalition—a working group they run for Israel and Palestine’s top NGOs dedicated to promoting the two-state solution.

ALLMEP organized a full two-hour session—part private, part on-the-record in front of a slew of press and local diplomats—in which some two dozen representatives of peace NGOs shared remarks on a range of urgent priorities and recommendations for EU policy, including on Gaza aid and protection, Israeli and Palestinian public attitudes, settlements, Jerusalem, scaling cross-border peacebuilding cooperation and the role of women.

Watch Nivine Sandouka’s remarks, ALLMEP’s Regional Director, here:

They also gave feedback and an endorsement to the EU High Representative’s own speech during the discussion where he laid out five principles for EU peacemaking:

• Support the peace camp: Emphasizing the need for backing those advocating for a just, secure and peaceful resolution to the conflict.
• Confront spoilers: Addressing individuals or groups that undermine peace efforts.
• Stick to the facts: Focusing on factual information rather than narratives that perpetuate conflict.
• Protect the UN & international law: Ensuring that international law is upheld and respected.
• Make use of EU leverage: Utilizing the European Union’s influence to promote peace initiatives effectively

As much as the HR/VP’s presence elevated the role of Palestinian and Israeli civil society peacebuilding, the interaction equipped Mr. Borrell with critical insights and directions for him to integrate into promoting these principles during his final weeks in office, and to pass on to his successor, Ms. Kaja Kallas. ALLMEP, the Geneva Initiative and Palestinian Peace Coalition added a short list of immediate priorities to this chorus of messages from peace actors in a post-session private meeting with the High Representative. And he agreed to extend his platforming of peacebuilders at a summit in Berlin this week organized by Principles4Peace.

Amid the volatile present reality, with dramatic global leadership changes on the horizon and no “day after” to the catastrophic situation in Gaza in sight, this pivotal meeting—made possible thanks to the partnership and flexibility of the EU High Representative, and the gracious hosts at the Palestinian Peace Coalition and Geneva Initiative—will help ALLMEP to solidify coordinated international government support to scaling the vital work of Israeli-Palestinian civil society peacebuilding toward a sustainable future that the souls of this hallowed and heartbroken land so badly deserve.

Brian Reeves is ALLMEP’s Director of Strategic Relations