Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn Friday called for harshly condemning Israel’s prospective move to annex parts of the occupied West Bank.

Asselborn called for a harsh condemnation against Israel’s move to apply sovereignty to, in other words to annex, parts of the occupied West Bank.

“If you annex a territory that you do not own, it is a serious violation of international law,” Asselborn said during an interview with the German news agency DPA.

He added that the European Union “must now take a preventive position and apply pressure” on Israel, the occupying authority, and noted that Israel “should fear far-reaching punitive measures.”

The EU foreign ministers, reported the Associated Press, will weigh later today what action the bloc could take should Israel push ahead with the annexation plan.

On July 1, Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, will be able to vote on the annexation of large swaths of the West Bank on the basis of the US-touted Mideast plan, dubbed deal of the century, which in fact endorses Israel’s longstanding policy of permanent occupation, colonialism and apartheid over the Palestinian people.

Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu has declared many times his willingness to annex the illegal colonial settlements besides to the Jordan Valley, a fertile strip of land running west along the Jordan River, which is home of some 65,000 Palestinians and makes up approximately 30 percent of the West Bank, upon the formation of the new coalition government.

The annexation of Palestinian territory occupied in 1967 is illegal under international law, and it would put much of the occupied West Bank under Israeli sovereignty, leaving only a few small pockets of densely populated Palestinian bantustans.