The European Union reached a unanimous political agreement on Monday (May 11, 2026) to issue new sanctions on Hamas leaders and the Israeli settler movement, top European diplomats said, after years of deadlock and growing popular pressure sparked by the carnage in Gaza.

The EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said in a social media post after a meeting in Brussels on Monday of the 27-nation bloc‘s Foreign Ministers that extremism and violence should carry consequences.

“It was high time we moved from deadlock to delivery,” she said.

The group failed to endorse even stronger measures pushed by some European governments and did not immediately release details of the new measures, but French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said the Ministers had decided to sanction Hamas leaders and both leaders and organisations in the Israeli settler movement in the West Bank.

‘Violent colonisation’

“The EU is sanctioning today the main Israeli organisations guilty of supporting the extremist and violent colonisation of the West Bank, as well as their leaders. These most serious and intolerable acts must cease without delay,” he said.

“It is sanctioning the main leaders of Hamas, a terrorist movement that must be disarmed and excluded from any participation in the future of Palestine,” Mr. Barrot said.

The sanctions could signal a turning point in the EU’s Israel policy.

However, EU diplomats failed to agree on stronger actions to pressure Israel like banning products from Israeli settlements in the West Bank or suspending a key trade agreement.