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| By Israel Insider staff November 18, 2007 |
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The timing of the Israeli national football squad could not have been better, at least for Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and her British counterpart, David Miliband.
Israel stunned Russia with a stoppage time goal by Omer Golan to win the game 2-1, despite being outplayed throughout the match by the Russians. Although the Israeli team was out of contention to advance to the next round, the victory meant that the British team needs only to draw in its Wednesday match against Croatia to advance instead Russia.
Livni began the joint news conference [watch video] by referring to the victory. "I think this visit is a successful visit even before it started due to the Israeli achievement in the football game that makes some of the streets of London very happy and supportive when it comes to Israel. But, of course, we also had some -- I don't want to say more serious, because football is serious enough, but we also discussed the situation in the region, the future of the bilateral tracks between Israel and the Palestinians when it comes to Annapolis and the day after Annapolis, the threat coming from Iran to the region and to the world as well."
Miliband continued in the same vein, noting that "in addition to the football," bilateral relations are "strong" and "deep" and "I look forward to taking that to ever greater levels."
The first question also asked Miliband whether he had a message to the Israeli football team, but it also touched on the recent revelation of a private email exchange that made it clear that His Royal Highness Prince Charles refused to visit Israel because he doesn't want to improve Israel's international image by visiting.
Miliband did more fancy footwork than Israel's Golan to try and wriggle out of that one. "Let me deal with the question about Prince Charles first because I think it will be a very -- not very bad but very wrong for anyone in Israel to have the impression that somehow Prince Charles didn't want to come here on the base of an e-mail exchange amongst his staff. I spoke to Prince Charles on Friday evening after I'd read the story in the newspapers on Friday and he said to me that he remembered well his last visit here at the time of the -- the tragic time of Yitzchak Rabin's funeral. He also made it absolutely clear, and I'm very pleased to make it clear today, that as soon as the Israeli government is -- assuming the Israeli government is keen to organize a visit by the Prince of Whales and of course all other members of the Royal Family, then of course the government and Clarence House will be happy to enter into those discussions to find the right time and the right place to take this forward. So I think we can scotch comprehensively any suggestion of difficulties in that area."
Miliband then reverted to the safer turf of football, referring to the Israeli star Yossi Benayoun, who recently scored a three-goal "hat trick" but then was placed on the injured list by his Liverpool squad. He implied, presumably in jest, that the injury was the reason that a royal visit to Israel had to be reconsidered. "we were all very worried when Mr. Benayoun was ruled out by injury, the Liverpool star. Obviously we had to think whether the visit could take place under such a deep, diplomatic cloud but we rejoice in the success of Israel yesterday and we look forward to making sure that our side of the bargain, which is the correct result against Croatia, is the next step, but we're extremely grateful to the Israeli team for their help in this regard.
Livni chimed in: "And that our success is their success."
Lucky for her the Russian minister wasn't also in for a visit.
For now, she can at least be content that the Brits won't be pushing Israel to give back the Golan. At least not the player.
But when Yossi Benayoun is feeling better, we'll be expecting to see His Royal Highness.
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