During his term as prime minister, Ehud Olmert rejected an
invitation by former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and other Arab
leaders to address an Arab League convention and set in motion a
regional process based on the Saudi peace initiative.
Haaretz has learned that the initiative first took place in a conference hosted by the Spanish Foreign Ministry in Madrid in 2007, marking 15 years to the original Madrid conference, where talks between Israel, the Palestinians, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria were initiated. The 2007 convention was attended by senior officials from Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, as well as Palestinians and Israelis.
Haaretz has learned that the initiative first took place in a conference hosted by the Spanish Foreign Ministry in Madrid in 2007, marking 15 years to the original Madrid conference, where talks between Israel, the Palestinians, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria were initiated. The 2007 convention was attended by senior officials from Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, as well as Palestinians and Israelis.
The Israeli delegation included
Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor (who did not hold an official position
at the time), former ministers Moshe Shahal and Shlomo Ben Ami, Member
of Knesset Yisrael Hasson (Kadima) and former MKs Dalia Rabin, Ophir
Pines and Colette Avital.
The Palestinian Authority was
represented by Fatah leaders Jibril Rajoub and Nabil Shaath. Several
European foreign ministers also attended the assembly, along with the
European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana.
In a speech delivered in Arabic,
Shahal called on the Arab League to invite officials of the "Peace
Circle," which he headed at the time, to present their response to the
Arab peace initiative, as well as the Saudi Peace initiative from 2002.
Such invitation, Shahal suggested, would helpful in exploring the
possibility to advance toward a comprehensive solution based on the Arab
initiative, which offered Israel peace and the normalization of
relationship with all Arab League nations in return for an Israeli
withdrawal from the territories captured in 1967, and an agreed-upon
solution of the refugee problem based on UN resolution 194.
In a meeting with Osama El-Baz,
Mubarak's advisor at the time, Shahal was asked if there was a
possibility of mobilizing the Olmert government to support the Arab
initiative. Shahal expressed willingness to offer Olmert to declare
that, in principle, Israel was ready to hold talks with all Arab states
concerning a regional agreement, based on the frameworks of the
initiative, on condition that Olmert be invited to present the
declaration in a special Arab League assembly, as former Egyptian
president Anwar Sadat was invited to address the Knesset in Jerusalem in
1977(1)
Very predictable if you accept Olmert was never really in favour of a fair peace. By backing down from this offer he may have blown the prospects for a fair peace.
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