Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi held a phone call on Wednesday in which they discussed the readiness to resume peace and achieve calm with Israel, the Xinhua news agency reported.
According to the report, Abbas explained to Al-Sisi the Palestinian side’s readiness to act under the auspices of the Middle East Quartet, which comprises the United States, Russia, the European Union, and the UN.
Abbas told the Egyptian President that complete calm is crucial in all Palestinian territories along with the need to “halt the attacks of the Israeli army forces and settlers against the Palestinians.”
Al-Sisi, for his party, told Abbas that Egypt firmly supports the Palestinian state and the Palestinian people led by Abbas, and considers the Palestine Liberation Organization the sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.
The Egyptian President has in the past urged Israelis and Palestinian Arabs to seize what he said was a “real opportunity” for peace and hailed his own country’s peace deal with Israel. He repeated his call for a resumption of peace talks between Israel and the PA in September of 2018.
Abbas, who has refused to renew peace talks with Israel, issued an ultimatum to Israel in his recent UN speech, and threatened to take back the PA’s recognition of Israel if it does not withdraw from Judea, Samaria, Gaza and eastern Jerusalem within a year.
Past efforts under the Obama administration to broker a peace agreement failed in 2014 when the PA unilaterally applied to join international organizations in breach of the conditions of the talks.