Banning Trade with the West Bank

Via Kevin Heller, here is the opinion of James Crawford on a possible EU ban on trade with the West Bank settlements as it relates to WTO issues:

133. For the sake of completeness, it might also be mentioned that in extending a ban on settlement trade, the EC would not be in breach of its obligations under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), now subsumed within the covered agreements of the World Trade Organization (WTO). 243  Although  GATT Article I requires that most favoured nation treatment be extended to Israel as a WTO Member, and GATT Article XI forbids the use of quantitative restrictions such as a ban on imports, both these provisions are phrased in terms of products originating in the ‘territory’ of another WTO Member. As a matter of international law, the West Bank and Gaza cannot be considered to be Israel’s territory; thus the EC is not prevented by its  GATT/WTO obligations from banning settlement trade.