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Egypt: Israeli Defence Minister to visit Egypt
Tue. May 20, 2008 01:54 am.- By Bonny Apunyu. -
(SomaliNet) As tension mounts over rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak will on Monday meet Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, whose government is trying to arrange a truce between the Jewish state and Hamas.
The Israeli official is also expected to meet Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh where political leaders and business people are gathered for the Middle East World Economic Forum.
Egypt has been acting as mediator because Israel refuses to negotiate directly with the Islamist Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, as it considers the group to be a terrorist organisation.
In exchange for stopping rocket attacks, Hamas has said it wants Israel to lift the blockade of Gaza and reopen border crossings, especially Rafah on the frontier with Egypt.
Israel has demanded an end to rocket attacks and arms smuggling from Egypt's Sinai peninsula, as well as progress in negotiations to release Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, captured by Palestinian militants in 2006.
"Today, we are thinking above all... of Gilad Shalit and of our commitment to assure calm and security in (the southern Israeli town of) Ashkelon and other areas bordering the Gaza Strip in an appropriate way," Barak told reporters in Tel Aviv before leaving for Sharm el-Sheikh.
Hamas wants 450 Palestinian prisoners freed in exchange for Shalit, whose fate has become a sticking point in negotiations.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that Israel was "very close" to deciding on what action to take to stop rocket attacks from Gaza.
"Under no circumstances can we allow the situation in the south (of Israel) to continue the way it has in recent months, and the crossroads on a decision on how things will be handled is very close," Olmert said at a weekly cabinet meeting.
He declined to elaborate amid calls from some ministers for Israel to launch a widescale assault on Gaza to crush Palestinian militants, who fired a rocket at a shopping mall in southern Israel on Wednesday while US President George Bush was in the country.
Bush wrapped up a Middle East tour with a speech in Egypt on Sunday accusing Hamas of pursuing a policy of terror.
"All nations in the region must stand together in confronting Hamas, which is attempting to undermine efforts at peace with continued acts of terror and violence," Bush said.-Sapa-AFP
News Category: Africa
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