JERUSALEM: A senior member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government hinted yesterday that Israel was involved in back-channel contacts with Palestinian and Arab officials.
Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman confirmed that Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, Israel’s main negotiator in nine months of talks, had met secretly in London this past week with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
“I think that it’s true that she met (him),” Lieberman told Israel’s Channel 2 television when asked about a report the same station had broadcast on Friday saying the two had met.
Lieberman said it had been “a private meeting” and did not mean negotiations had resumed, though his comments were the first official confirmation that the sides were in direct contact despite the suspension of formal diplomacy.
Livni has confirmed she visited London but aides have declined comment on reports that she met Abbas there. Abbas has also made no comment.
Lieberman said Israel was sticking by its decision of last month to suspend formal talks with the Palestinians over Abbas’s deal to forge a unity government with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Lieberman said “there is no stagnation” in diplomacy despite the negotiations’ formal end.
“The fact there are no negotiations with Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) doesn’t mean there aren’t other things” taking place, he said, suggesting Israel should seek out other figures, including in the Arab business world, as potential partners and dismissing the possibility of a deal with Abbas.
REUTERS
