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Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Restart of peace process to help defuse tensions in Middle East — Egypt’s top diplomat

The Egypt-brokered ceasefire in the Gaza Strip came into force overnight to May 21, after eleven days of missile strikes

CAIRO, May 23. /TASS/. The soonest restart of the peace process in the Middle East would help to defuse tensions in the region, otherwise the conflict would continue, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said on Saturday.

"We need to intensify efforts in order to resume peace talks as soon as possible," the Al Youm Al Sabea quoted the Egyptian top diplomat as saying at a meeting with his Cypriot counterpart, Nikos Christodoulides. "The lack of real perspectives for restarting the peace process may cause the conflict to continue."

Egypt’s president, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, also mentioned the importance of resuming Israeli-Palestinian talks during his meeting with Christodoulides. "We should engage in field work to start peace talks based on the two-state principle, as well as on international resolutions and norms of the international law," he said.

The Egypt-brokered ceasefire in the Gaza Strip came into force overnight to May 21, after eleven days of missile strikes. At present, the main task of the Palestinian government is to cope with consequences of the aerial attacks, which inflicted the damage of about $350 million. Moreover, 80% of Gaza residents currently experience problems with water and electricity supplies.

Radical Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip and the Israeli army have been exchanging bombardments since May 10, following unrest near the Al Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem, triggered by an Israeli court ruling to confiscate homes from several Arab families in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.

The radicals fired more than 4,000 missiles against the territory of the Jewish state. In retaliation the Israeli military bombed hundreds of targets in the enclave. A total of 232 Palestinians were killed and 1,900 injured in Gaza and no less than twelve people in Israel.

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Israeli-Palestinian conflict

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