Jordan hosted a meeting between top Israeli and Palestinian officials on Sunday aiming to halt surging violence, an official said, as Washington and its Arab allies seek to defuse tensions which are fuelling concern of a wider escalation.
The discussions are part of stepped-up Jordanian diplomacy with Washington and Egypt to put the brakes on one of the worst surges in violence in years, with concern building of further escalation as the holy Muslim month of Ramadan approaches.
The meeting at the Red Sea port of Aqaba brought together top Israeli and Palestinian security chiefs for the first time in many years, officials said, aiming to restore calm in Israel, the Israeli-occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
US President Joe Biden’s West Asia adviser Brett McGurk is attending, along with Jordanian and Egyptian officials.
But underlining the challenges, the Palestinian Hamas group — which governs Gaza — criticised the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority for taking part, calling it a “stab in the back of the Palestinian people”.
A senior Jordanian official told Reuters the meeting aimed to restore calm while also giving Palestinians hope for a political future with an independent state on land Israel occupied in a 1967 war, including East Jerusalem.
“The objective is to reach an agreement on stopping all unilateral measures with a view to achieving a period of calm that would allow for confidence-building measures and lead to more political engagement,” the official said.
“If the parties fail to reach an agreement then the dynamics on the ground point to further escalation that will lead to violence that will hurt everybody.”
Israel’s Army Radio said the sides may discuss measures to boost Palestinian security forces in the West Bank as well as a possible reining in of Israeli settlement activity.
Israel’s Maariv newspaper quoted national security adviser Tzachi Hanegbi as saying: “Discussions were held with the Americans about how to create a new atmosphere by ending the unilateral steps that were taken in the past few months. We are willing to (accept) that.”
