Katz meets Arab Foreign Minister from unnamed country at U.N.

“A first, fascinating meeting yesterday on the sidelines of the UN meeting with one of the Arab foreign ministers,” Katz wrote on his twitter account.

By HERB KEINON
Israel's Finance Minister Israel Katz (photo credit: SEBASTIAN SCHEINER/POOL VIA REUTERS)
Israel's Finance Minister Israel Katz
(photo credit: SEBASTIAN SCHEINER/POOL VIA REUTERS)
Foreign Minister Israel Katz met with the foreign minister of an unidentified Arab country on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly on Monday. The Arab country does not have foreign relations with Israel.
“A first, fascinating meeting yesterday on the sidelines of the UN meeting with one of the Arab foreign ministers,” Katz tweeted. “We discussed in-depth the regional realities and ways to deal with the Iranian threat, while at the same time agreeing on a process for promoting civilian cooperation between the two countries. A new and challenging reality.”
This was Katz’s third public meeting in the last three months with a senior Arab diplomatic official. He met with Bahrain's Foreign Minister at an August conference in Washington, and with a senior UAE official at another conference in Abu Dhabi in July.
At a meeting of the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee in August, Katz said that promoting normalization with the Arab world was one of his top priorities.
In general, Katz said at that meeting, “Israel does have relations with the Persian Gulf countries – diplomatic ties, security ties, business ties – there were and are things. My goal, with the full backing of the prime minister, is to work toward open normalization, to widen it and make it public and to reach diplomatic agreements with them,” presumably similar to the peace agreements Israel has with Jordan and Egypt.
Katz is representing Israel at the annual UN gathering in place of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who canceled his trip to the US because of the election. Scheduled to meet with US President Donald Trump and deliver an address at the General Assembly, this is the first year since 2010 that he has not attended.
In the past, Netanyahu used the UN General Assembly as an occasion to meet with the heads of numerous countries. Katz – who is scheduled to address the world body on Thursday – is expected to meet a long list of foreign ministers during his stay in New York. He is scheduled to return to Israel on Friday.
Katz met Tuesday with his Brazilian counterpart, Ernesto Henrique Fraga Araújo, and urged Brazil to recognize Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, something that both Argentina and Paraguay did earlier this summer.
“The whole world must unite for the struggle against the terrorism spread by Iran and its proxies. Israel will continue to work everywhere in order to include Hezbollah on the list of terrorist organizations, said Katz.
Araújo, according to Katz’s office, said that his country was working on the matter.
Hezbollah is believed to be very active in the porous tri-border area where Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay meet, and where funds for its operations are raised. The US has urged its Latin American allies – including Brazil – to blacklist Hezbollah, to significantly impact the organization’s financing from foreign sources.