How an EU envoy lied to hide Israel lobby contacts

Sven Koopmans was enthusiastic about keeping in touch with genocide advocates.

Sven Koopmans, until recently the EU’s Middle East peace envoy. (College of Europe)

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An excuse offered by the European Union to conceal its contacts with the pro-Israel lobby has been exposed as dishonest.

Shortly before stepping down as the EU’s Middle East peace envoy earlier this year, Sven Koopmans rejected a freedom of information request I had submitted for correspondence between his office and the American Jewish Committee (AJC). Bizarrely, Koopmans had claimed that disclosing the documents would carry the risk of “possible malicious foreign interference.”

The rejection has now been overturned and the correspondence released – after I complained to the EU’s ombudsman about Koopmans’ excuse.

Because the content of those exchanges cannot be regarded in any way as sensitive, it is clear that Koopmans’ allegation about “possible malicious foreign interference” was baseless.

The correspondence indicates that Koopmans’ staff reached out to the AJC while he was planning a trip to New York in September last year. His staff inquired if Koopmans could hold discussions with that group during the trip.

In response, the AJC declared itself “so pleased” that Koopmans would be available for a meeting. Arrangements were then made so that Koopmans could visit the AJC’s headquarters.

Koopmans did not reply to a request for comment about the excuse he offered for withholding this correspondence. While there was zero risk of “possible malicious foreign interference” from the disclosure, I concede that there was a risk of embarrassment.

Enthusiastic

The documents suggest that Koopmans was enthusiastic about keeping in touch with the AJC despite how it has supported the genocidal war against Gaza.

A major player in the pro-Israel advocacy network, the AJC has repeatedly sought to justify attacks on and the destruction of civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and schools.

As the AJC depicts acts of aggression and annihilation as reasonable and unavoidable, it is not surprising that Koopmans would want his dealings with such a group kept secret. Yet that doesn’t alter the fact that he invented a lie about “possible malicious foreign interference” to break transparency rules that nominally guide all the EU’s activities.

Koopmans is among quite a few public servants who have been accommodating toward Israel and its advocates as the death toll mounts in Gaza.

Through a separate freedom of information request, I learned that the AJC’s Brussels office facilitated a lobby tour for NGO Monitor – a particularly extreme pro-Israel group – earlier this year.

The AJC gave false details about NGO Monitor by describing it as a “Jerusalem-based research institute” working to “ensure that decision makers and civil society operate in accordance with the principles of accountability, transparency and universal human rights.” The truth is that NGO Monitor has a long and ignoble record of smearing activists who argue that universal human rights must apply to Palestinians.

Even though those details were manifestly inaccurate, Christine O’Dwyer, an adviser to the EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, found time for a discussion with NGO Monitor. She did so at the behest of the AJC.

I emailed O’Dwyer asking if she was aware of how the AJC had contended that Israel would be justified in attacking hospitals and, if so, why was she accommodating toward such a group.

“I have a policy of meeting interlocutors from both sides and I endeavor to pursue an open door policy,” she replied. “Meeting with different representatives is part of my job.”

The phrase “both sides” is misleading and reprehensible in this context as it implies there is some equivalence between Israel, a genocidal oppressor, and its victims, the Palestinians.

O’Dwyer’s inference that the EU is being balanced was contradicted by her own boss Kaja Kallas in March. Kallas had no qualms about celebrating how the EU and Israel are “very good partners” just days after Israel resumed full-scale attacks on Gaza.

The partnership is finally under a little strain. Most EU governments agreed in May – 19 months into the genocide – on the miminal step of reviewing relations with Israel.

The genocide – lest we forget – was endorsed at the beginning by Ursula von der Leyen, perhaps the EU’s most powerful politician.

This week von der Leyen was promoting a fresh package of sanctions. The sanctions target Russia, not Israel.

Her transatlantic partner in discussions about the sanctions was Lindsey Graham, a US senator, whose recommended strategy for Gaza is “level the place.” Graham is among a number of pro-Israel zealots who have expressed a desire that the inspiring campaigner Greta Thunberg be harmed as she attempts to break the maritime blockade on Gaza.

Thunberg is an EU citizen and has been previously welcomed to Brussels by von der Leyen. That was back in 2020, when EU officials pretended they were listening to what teenagers were saying about climate change.

If von der Leyen was troubled by how Graham wishes to see a young woman suffer, then she did not say so – at least not in public. The readout of von der Leyen’s conversation with Graham does not mention his comments about Thunberg or Palestine more generally.

Von der Leyen finally called Israel’s violence against Gaza “abhorrent” toward the end of last month. She did not, however, call for any concrete measures or disown the assurance that Israel could “count on” the EU’s support which she gave when the genocide was already at full tilt in October 2023.

As Israel came into existence through the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians, its behavior has always been abhorrent. Von der Leyen does not deserve any plaudits for her belated and completely inadequate criticism.

•First published by The Electronic Intifada, 4 June 2025.