EU calls for ‘pauses’ in Gaza fighting amid doubts over bloc's influence

“We’ve got some sort of agreement. It does paper over the cracks,” said Ian Bond, director of foreign policy at the Centre for European Reform.

“It took them some time to agree on the eventual formula. They seem to have spent a long time arguing about whether there should be a ‘pause’ for humanitarian purposes, or ‘pauses.’ A lot of people apparently thought that the former sounded a bit too close to a ceasefire, which they didn't want to call for,” Bond said.

...“The reality in any case is that the EU's influence over Israel in particular has been quite limited for quite a long time, particularly under the [Israeli] Netanyahu government. He is clearly not a fan of the EU, and so I’m not sure that he will have been all that interested in whether they called for ‘a pause’ or ‘pauses,’ ” Bond said.

...“Most member-states are still firmly behind Ukraine, firmly behind aid for Ukraine and supportive of Ukraine's ambitions to become a member of the European Union and to start accession negotiations, probably in the new year,” Bond told VOA.