Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s combative address to the United Nations General Assembly on Monday could be called Bibi’s “Greatest Hits,” one pundit suggested. Except it had a new tune toward the end.

The speech indeed included many arguments and talking points he has used before: the danger of a nuclear-armed Iran, Hamas’s cynical use of human shields in Gaza, hypocrisy at the UN Human Rights Council, and so on. The prime minister even recycled some of the same phrases he has used in recent weeks, repeating his analogy of Hamas and Islamic State being “branches of the same poisonous tree,” and saying the Nazis believed in a master race while militant Islamists worship a “master faith.”

But late in his 35-minute speech, he broke rhetorical ground when he reached out to “leading states in the Arab world,” suggesting that increased cooperation — and eventually full recognition and peace — could ultimately lead to a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“I believe that with a fresh approach from our neighbors, we can advance peace despite the difficulties we face,” Netanyahu said. Borrowing from an idea advanced recently by Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, Netanyahu turned the Arab Peace Initiative upside down. “But the old template for peace,” he continued, “must be updated. It must take into account new realities and new roles and responsibilities for our Arab neighbors.”

Launched by Saudi Arabia in 2002, the Arab Peace Initiative promises Israel full diplomatic relations with all Arab and Muslim states as soon as its conflict with the Palestinians is solved. On Monday, Netanyahu reversed that idea chronology: “Many have long assumed that an Israeli-Palestinian peace can help facilitate a broader rapprochement between Israel and the Arab World,” he said. “But these days I think it may work the other way around: Namely that a broader rapprochement between Israel and the Arab world may help facilitate an Israeli-Palestinian peace.”

Read the article in full at Times of Israel.