Today’s Zaman
06.09.2007
Peres meets Palestinians in Turkish-led initiative
Shimon Peres yesterday met with members of a
Turkish-Israeli-Palestinian business forum, the very first time
Palestinian businessmen have been received by an Israeli president.
"Two-and-a-half years ago, when we had the first meeting in Ankara, we
failed to convince Israeli and Palestinian businessmen to agree even
to get on the same minibus," said Rifat Hisarcýklýoðlu, whose Turkish
Union of Chambers and Commodities Exchanges (TOBB) heads the joint
Turkish-Israeli-Palestinian forum. "Today, they are received together
by the Israeli president and pose together for the cameras."
The forum, which held its first meeting in 2005 in Ankara at the
initiative of then-Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül, has since been named
the Ankara Forum for Economic Cooperation. The latest meeting in East
Jerusalem was the sixth gathering of Turkish, Israeli and Palestinian
members.
Gül first floated the idea during a visit to Israel and Palestinian
territories in late 2004; its motto was "industry for peace." The
forum seeks, as its primary objective, to foster economic cooperation
between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, such as the 2006
transformation of the Erez Industrial Park into a Palestinian
industrial free zone.
Hisarcýklýoðlu was received by Peres together with Shraga Brosh,
president of the Manufacturers Association of Israel, and Ahmed Hashem
Al-Zughair, chairman of the Palestinian Chambers of Commerce, Industry
and Agriculture.
The TOBB chairman requested a presidential summit of the three
countries in Turkey to sign memorandums reiterating political
willingness to further develop the "industry for peace" initiative. He
suggested that he had been encouraged by the fact that three leaders
known to support economic efforts for peace in the Middle East —
namely Peres in Israel, Gül in Turkey and Mahmoud Abbas in Palestine
— are at the helm of the state apparatus in their respective
countries. Peres said he would be glad to attend such a meeting if
preliminary work among foreign ministers of the three sides comes up
with a go-ahead for such a gathering.
Plans forged at 6th forum meeting
The sixth meeting of the forum opened on Tuesday and was attended by
some 20 businessmen from Turkey, Israel and Palestine. The
participants agreed on plans to establish a joint Israeli-Palestinian
industrial park in the West Bank and a permanent office for the forum
in East Jerusalem.
"We have been putting much effort recently into building stronger
business relationships between Israel and the Palestinian Authority,"
Israel’s Brosh was quoted as saying yesterday in the Jerusalem Post.
"We hope that the establishment of the industrial park will lead to
‘economic peace’ between the two business communities and will also
strengthen the political ties between Israel and the Palestinian
Authority."
Should an additional industrial park be established, the day-to-day
operations will be overseen, as at Erez, by an international
corporation run by Turkey. TOBB, which oversees the Erez industrial
zone, will perform the same function in the additional industrial
zone. There also will be major Turkish investment in plants in the
industrial area, which would manufacture goods that then would be able
to enter the EU, the US and even Persian Gulf countries duty-free,
according to the newspaper. The hope is that, similar to Erez, both
Palestinian and Israeli businessmen will invest in this area.
Brosh added that since the Turks have taken over operations at Erez,
some 100 factories employing approximately 5,000 Palestinian workers
have been established, expressing his hope that the new industrial
zone will match the Erez’s success.
Support from Blair
Forum representatives also met with former British Prime Minister Tony
Blair, now the Quartet’s special envoy in the Middle East, in
Jerusalem yesterday. Blair was in Jerusalem as part of a 10-day trip
to the Middle East.
Blair was briefed by Ankara Forum for Economic Cooperation
participants about the forum’s activities during a half-hour meeting
that was closed to the press. He praised the initiative and offered
his help if needed, meeting participants said. He also said he
attached great importance to Turkey’s role in the Middle East and
wanted to visit Turkey before a planned international conference on
the Middle East.
The forum’s Turkish delegation also met with Palestinian President
Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian PM Salam Fayyad on Wednesday.
Peres: Armenian issue should be tackled by historians
Israeli President Shimon Peres defended a neutral political stance on
Armenian claims of genocide at the hands of the late Ottoman Empire,
saying the issue should be left to historians.
"I agree with what Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoðan said. The past
is in the past and the best thing to do would be to leave the issue to
historians," Peres said as he received a delegation of Turkish,
Israeli and Palestinian businessmen members of the Ankara Forum for
Economic Cooperation.
An influential US Jewish group, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), last
month revised its long-held position and said the World War I events
should be considered genocide. Turkish officials were then reassured
by Israel that the country’s position has not changed with the ADL
move and that it remained opposed to resolutions in the US Congress
that support the Armenian claims.
Peres said he has talked to US Congress officials on the matter and
emphasized that a Congress resolution would be irrelevant and
unnecessary in such a context. "No resolution can change history," he
said, adding that a politician’s duty is to deal with the future.
Hisarcýklýoðlu said for his part that passage of such a resolution in
the US Congress would harm not only Turkey-US relations, but also
Turkey’s ties with other countries, apparently referring to relations
with Israel.
06.09.2007
News
FÝKRÝ TÜRKEL
Source: =detay&link=121408
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
