BICOM

Israel’s Transport Minister has told a leading US newspaper that greater regional cooperation can help forge a diplomatic solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Yisrael Katz, who heads the Ministry of Intelligence and the Ministry of Transport, gave an extensive interview to the Washington Post. Described in the article as a “political bulldozer,” Katz is a senior figure in Likud, a member of Israel’s security cabinet but does not support a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Katz said that he prefers a “layered peace that starts with security coordination between Israel and the moderate Arab countries, including moderate Palestinians”. He talked about the extensive relations that already exist between Israel and Sunni Arab states, including those “where we have no peace agreement or diplomatic relations”.

He added: “One of the goals of the new US administration is to strengthen the relationships between Israel and these states.”

Katz believes that economic peace will follow security and intelligence cooperation. To this end, he said that plans already exist, with Netanyahu’s backing, to extend Israel’s existing train line to Beit She’an in the Jordan Valley into Jordan and from there across the whole region. Katz concluded that “security coordination and economic peace will help bring about the diplomatic, political peace [between Israel and the Palestinians], which is more complicated for all different reasons”.

Israeli news site NRG has reported this morning that an Iranian news agency believes the Saudi intelligence chief, Khaled al-Hamidan, secretly visited Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) last week. No Israeli or PA officials have confirmed the report, which claims that al-Hamidan “discussed, with high-ranking Israeli and Palestinian officials, security issues that are related to the regional summit that might be held between Israel and the moderate Sunni countries,” as mentioned by US President Donald Trump during Netanyahu’s recent visit to Washington.