Amman - Egyptian Foreign Ministers Ahmed Abul Gheit held separate meetings Monday with Jordan's King Abdullah II and Prime Minister Nader Dahabi in a bid to come up with a "unified Arab stand" ahead of US President Barack Obama's visit to Egypt on Thursday, officials said. The discussions focused on "the need to forge a unified Arab stand in the forthcoming stage which is expected to witness intensive diplomatic activity," with the avowed aim of re-launching serious negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians to reach a solution based on the two-state vision, an official statement said.
The statement referred mainly to Obama's trip to Cairo during which he intended to send a message to the Islamic world.
Dahabi and Abul Gheit stressed the need for "confronting attempts by some sides to derail any progress towards a final solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict that ensures the setting up of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital and Israel's evacuation of all occupied Arab territories," the statement added.
They alluded to the right-wing Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which has failed so far to accept the two-state formula and instead offered Palestinians "economic peace."
Netanyahu on Monday reiterated his rejection of Obama's recurrent calls for stopping all forms of settlement activity in the Palestinian territories as a prelude for resuming peace talks with the Palestinians.
