{Jerusalem (AFP) – Israel has hit out at Sweden’s newly elected prime minister Stefan Loefven over his decision to recognise a Palestinian state.
\n}<\/p>\n
“Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said that he regrets that the new prime minister was in a hurry to make statements on Sweden’s position regarding recognition of a Palestinian state, apparently before he had time even to study the issue in depth,” Lieberman’s office quoted him as saying, in a statement issued late Saturday.<\/p>\n
It added that Sweden’s ambassador to Israel, Carl Magnus Nesser, “will be invited for a talk at the foreign ministry in Jerusalem,” but did not say when.<\/p>\n
“Prime Minister Loefven needs to understand that no statement or act by an external party can be a substitute for direct negotiations between the sides,” the statement said.<\/p>\n
Social Democrat leader Loefven — who won last month’s general election — said on Friday his country wanted to bolster a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.<\/p>\n
“A two-state solution requires mutual recognition and the will to co-exist peacefully,” Loefven said in his inaugural address to parliament.<\/p>\n
This should take place with respect for the “legitimate demands of the Palestinians and the Israelis as regards their right to self-determination and security”, he added.<\/p>\n
Sweden voted in favour of Palestinian observer status at the United Nations in 2012, which was granted despite opposition from the United States and other countries.<\/p>\n
Seven EU members in eastern European and the Mediterranean have already recognised a Palestinian state, namely Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Malta, Poland and Romania.<\/p>\n
Non-EU member Iceland is the only other western European nation to have done so.<\/p>\n
Loefven’s statement was warmly welcomed by the Palestinians but the United States, Israel’s ally, said it was a step too soon.<\/p>\n
“We believe international recognition of a Palestinian state is premature,” said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{Jerusalem (AFP) – Israel has hit out at Sweden’s newly elected prime minister Stefan Loefven over his decision to recognise a Palestinian state. } “Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said that he regrets that the new prime minister was in a hurry to make statements on Sweden’s position regarding recognition of a Palestinian state, apparently before […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2000054329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-16685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-internationl","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":{"id":2000054329,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton16685.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton16685.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton16685.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton16685.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton16685.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton16685.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000054329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16685"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=16685"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=16685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}