Dutch foreign minister resigns after failing to secure sanctions against Israel

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AMSTERDAM (AP) — Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp resigned Friday evening, after he failed to secure new sanctions against Israel over the war in Gaza.

Veldkamp had informed the country’s Parliament he intended to bring in new measures in response to Israel's planned offensive in Gaza City and other heavily populated areas but was unable to secure the support of his coalition partners.

The 61-year-old former ambassador to Israel told reporters he felt he was unable “to implement policy myself and chart the course I deem necessary.”

Following Veldkamp’s resignation, the remaining Cabinet members of his center-right New Social Contract party also quit, leaving the Dutch government in disarray.

“In short we are done with it,” party leader Eddy Van Hijum said, calling the Israeli government’s actions “diametrically opposed to international treaties.”

The Dutch government already collapsed in June when anti-Islam lawmaker Geert Wilders pulled out of the country’s four-party coalition over a fight about immigration.

The three remaining parties stayed on in a caretaker government until elections could be held in October.

Prime Minister Dick Schoof was set to address Parliament later Friday evening over the crisis.

The world’s leading authority on food crises said earlier on Friday the Gaza Strip’s largest city is gripped by famine, and that it’s likely to spread across the territory without a ceasefire and an end to restrictions on humanitarian aid.

The Netherlands’ Parliament had repeatedly delayed a debate on sanctions against Israel, a discussion that was already postponed from Thursday, as the Friday afternoon Cabinet meeting dragged on.

“There’s a famine, ethnic cleansing, and genocide going on,” Kati Piri of the merged Green Left/Labor parties told Parliament, “And our cabinet has been deliberating for hours about whether to take any action at all. Shameful.”

Veldkamp had proposed a ban on imports from Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories in response to the planned military escalation.

Opposition politicians had called for a no-confidence vote for the minister, frustrated at what they saw as a lack of action against Israel.