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Livni: the Arab states may not love you, but Condi will still take you out for lunch. (Flash90)
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| By Israel Insider staff November 29, 2007 |
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Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni failed in attempts to set up meetings in Annapolis or Washington with colleagues from the Arab world, even though the summit was designed to show international support for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
Livni, who had sought meetings with some of the 15 representatives from the Arab and Muslim world at the conference who do not yet have ties with Israel, had to make do with Salaheddin al-Bashir, the foreign minister of Jordan, a country that does have full diplomatic ties with Israel.
According to the Jerusalem Post, Livni had hope to fly to a North African country -- Morocco or Tunisia -- on her way home, but the invitations failed to materialize.
The Washington Post ran a story about what transpired insider the meeting on regional issues with Arab states. "Why doesn't anyone want to shake my hand?" Frans Timmermans, the Dutch minister for European affairs, recalled Livni asking. He said she also asked, "Why doesn't anyone want to be seen speaking to me?"
"She was saying 'Stop treating me as a pariah,' " Timmermans said. "They shun her like she is Count Dracula's younger sister."
However, the Israeli government Thursday morning disputed Timmermans' account of Livni's speech, delivered in Hebrew and simultaneously translated for the conference participants. The Israeli Foreign Ministry's official translation quotes Livni as saying: "I have heard some say that Israel should not expect a handshake, and I will not ask for one. But let us imagine what might happen if the worst possible scenario occurs and there is a handshake between an Israeli leader and an Arab leader whose country has no diplomatic relations with Israel, and that handshake is broadcast around the world." Such a gesture, she maintained, would send a message to Arab extremists that there is support for talks with Israel within the Arab world.
A Dutch embassy spokesman said Timmermans described the speech to The Washington Post as he recalled Livni delivering it, but did not dispute the official translation.
Disappointed Israeli officials lamented that the Arab world had not changed its fundamental policy that relations with Israel would not improve until after a deal, and that normalization was being used as bargaining chip. What a surprise.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert also failed to hold meetings with representatives of any Arab states. The best that he got was exchanging pleasantries and handshakes with a few -- the representatives from Qatar, Bahrain, Morocco and Pakistan -- after delivering his speech Tuesday in Annapolis. |
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