The Council of the European Union (EU) added Yahya Sinwar, the political leader of Hamas, to their terrorist list three months after the Hamas rampage in Israel on October 7.
The Council also added Ahmed Khaled Muller, a member of Al-Shabab in Somalia, to its autonomous sanctions list against ISIS and Al-Qaida. Muller has participated in combat operations and committed terrorist acts on behalf of Al-Shabab, a terrorist organization affiliated with Al-Qaida.
These individuals added to the terrorist list are now subject to the freezing of their funds and other financial assets in EU member states, while EU operators are prohibited from making funds and economic resources available to them.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz welcomed what he said was a “just and moral decision” by the EU.
“This decision is also a result of our diplomatic efforts to strangle the resources of the Hamas, to delegitimize them and prohibit all support to them,” Katz wrote on social media platform X. “We will continue to eradicate the root of evil, in Gaza and wherever it raises its head.”
The European Jewish Congress (EJC) also welcomed the decision. “The move is welcome, correct, and logical,” EJC President Ariel Muzicant said. “Hamas is a terror organization, there is no difference whatsoever between its so-called military and political wings and it should stand to reason that all its leaders should automatically appear on sanctions lists of the EU and its member states.
“The tragedy,” he said, “is that it took the massacre of October 7 for this recognition of the need to sanction Sinwar. It should now be evident to all who Hamas is and who its leaders are – a terror organization committed to the wiping out of Israel and the slaughter of Jews.”
The EJC called upon the European Union to “automatically extend this sanctions list to all senior political and military leaders of Hamas, whether those directly involved in the terror campaign in Gaza or those nestled up in the hotels of Qatar and Turkey. Europe must show no tolerance to terrorism anywhere.”
