The truce in the zone of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the most important thing that could happen in the region, but it does not eliminate the need to convene a ministerial meeting of the Middle East Quartet, Federation Council Vice-Speaker Konstantin Kosachev expressed this opinion on Friday.
"Russia has proposed convening a ministerial meeting of the Middle East Quartet of international mediators (Russia, US, UN, EU). I believe that the ceasefire does not cancel the subject of the agenda. We need to help the ceasefire turn into a long peace," he wrote on his Facebook page.
"The fighting in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict zone has been stopped since 2 a.m. local time. This is by far the most important thing that could have happened in the region," the senator added, stressing that the truce was the number one goal for the world community.
He believes that it was the position of the world community that influenced the ceasefire. Kosachev noted that the Russian Foreign Ministry has been in intensive talks not only with the parties to the conflict, but also with the United States and the European Union, "with which Russia has enough disagreements of its own." "However, the Middle East topic is one where our positions are close. Let's pay tribute to Egypt's active diplomacy, which largely made the agreement possible," Kosachev pointed out.
At the same time, he stressed that the fundamental causes of the conflict have not been removed, and its transition to a "smoldering mode" does not remove the underlying problems. "Israeli settlement activity in the Palestinian territories, the status of Jerusalem, refugees. The UN decision to create a Palestinian state has not actually been implemented. There is no and, it seems, no agreement between the parties on the status of the territories of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem. But there is only one way to achieve gradual movement towards a single objective - a long-term solution: the implementation of the relevant UN resolutions based on the two-state principle - Palestine and Israel," the FC Vice-Speaker is convinced.
About the situation
The ceasefire went into effect on Friday at 02:00 Palestinian and Israeli time (coinciding with Moscow time) between Israel and Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip.
Factions operating in Gaza and the Israeli army have been exchanging strikes since May 10. The rocket attacks followed riots at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem, which began because of an Israeli court decision to seize homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood from Arab families living there. During that time, more than 4,000 rockets were fired by radicals into the Jewish State, and the Israeli military responded by bombing hundreds of targets in the enclave. According to the latest figures from the Ministry of Health, the number of dead Palestinians in Gaza reached 232, 1,900 were wounded. The total number of victims of the conflict in the Palestinian territories, including the West Bank, is 260. On the Israeli side, at least 12 people were killed.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Federation Council
Based on materials from TASS