German minister: There is a chance for peace

Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger tells 'Post' Livni, Kerry given her impression there is a "difficult" chance for peace.

By YONAH JEREMY BOB
Livni and Kerry in Rome May 8, 2013370 (photo credit: REUTERS)
Livni and Kerry in Rome May 8, 2013370
(photo credit: REUTERS)
“I think at this moment there is a chance” for peace, visiting German Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.
She said the new Israeli government was more disposed toward peace and that “US Secretary of State John Kerry is very much engaged [in the process].”She added that “my colleague, Justice Minister Livni, she gives me the impression that there is a chance at this moment, it is difficult, but there is a chance.”
Later, the German minister met with Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein who thanked her for her government’s decision to publicly support listing Hezbollah’s armed wing as a terrorist organization.
“I hope and believe that if the organization is placed on the [EU] black list, it will add to the stability of the region where all of us live,” Edelstein said.
On Tuesday night, Livni asked that Germany support the initiative within the EU to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, at a meeting with Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger at Jerusalem’s King David Hotel.
The meeting of the two high-powered female justice ministers was the first major one of the German justice minister’s visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories, the German Embassy said.
Both Livni and Edelstein raised Germany’s proposed but stalled “Ghetto Law” meant to lead to reparations to some 20,000 Holocaust survivors who worked in ghettos without pay during World War II.
Both said that they hoped Germany could press onward with the law, any continued bureaucratic delays were significant as the population to whom it could apply was dwindling and was in real need of the financial aid.