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Middle East conflict

Opportunities for resolving Palestinian-Israeli conflict missed — Lavrov

The top Russian diplomat recalled that in 2016 Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a telephone call to Russian President Vladimir Putin and said he would like to start direct talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, if there were no preconditions

MOSCOW, November 15. /TASS/. There were many opportunities for resolving the conflict between Palestine and Israel, but they were all missed, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with RT.

"There were many opportunities. They were missed. There were attempts and it seemed that an agreement was round the corner. It has become some kind of tradition, it should be said, on both sides. The Palestinian position also took different turns, but it is important that we maintained relations with both sides," he said.

Lavrov recalled that in 2016 Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a telephone call to Russian President Vladimir Putin and said he would like to start direct talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, if there were no preconditions. He said the Palestinians were then "very upset by Israel's activities as far as settlements were concerned, families living there were being forcibly evicted, and the Palestinians had a precondition that this should stop."

"When Putin conveyed the message from Netanyahu, Abbas said: 'From you, from a good friend, out of respect, I will accept this offer'."

That was in August-September 2016. We immediately informed the Netanyahu administration, but nothing happened," Lavrov added.

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Foreign policy Sergey Lavrov

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