Saudi Arabia: No Talks With Israel Till…

Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry has said that its position on Palestine remains the same and that there would be no diplomatic relations with Israel until an independent Palestinian state is recognised on the basis of the 1967 border with East Jerusalem.

This comes a day after the White House National Security spokesperson John Kirby said that Washington had received positive feedback from Riyadh that both Saudi Arabia and Israel are willing to continue to have discussions on normalizing ties.

Both sides have been in talks over the last year at the behest of the US. Saudi Arabia’s Gulf allies Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates recognised Israel in 2020.

Meanwhile, in a bid to end the ongoing crisis in West Asia, US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators have upped their diplomatic push to bridge differences between Israel and Hamas on a ceasefire plan that would lead to an end of Israeli onslaught in Gaza and pave the way for releasing hostages.

Hamas has responded to a framework drawn up more than a week ago by US and Israeli spy chiefs at a meeting in Paris along with their counterparts from Egypt and Qatar. “In a positive spirit, ensuring a comprehensive and complete ceasefire, ending the aggression against our people, ensuring relief, shelter, and reconstruction, lifting the siege on the Gaza Strip, and achieving a prisoner swap,” Hamas said on February 6.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who is on a tour of West Asia, has said that he would discuss Hamas’ response with Israeli officials when he visits Israel today.

In Doha, Blinken said: “There’s still a lot of work to do … but we continue to believe that an agreement is possible, and indeed essential.”

Israel began its military offensive in Gaza after militants from Hamas killed 1,200 people and took 253 hostages in southern Israel on October 7.

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