Egypt’s Sissi says Israeli-PA peace talks not needed, instead calls for recognition of Palestinian state

Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi appears to discredit the moribund Israel-Palestinian peace process and instead calls on the international community to recognize a Palestinian state, which he says would have to be demilitarized.

During a joint news conference with the prime ministers of Spain and Belgium in Cairo, Sissi says reviving the process aimed at ending the Israel-Palestinian conflict “may not be what is required.”

“The results of this path faltering for 30 years tells us that we must” adopt a different approach, he says.

This would entail “the recognition of the Palestinian state by the international community and bringing it into the United Nations… This would show seriousness,” Sissi adds.

He clarifies that the Palestinian state would be demilitarized and that international forces will work to ensure this.

He points to the high civilian death toll in successive Gaza conflicts, saying the wars erupted because the “political horizons for resolving the Palestinian cause always failed” to fulfill the Palestinians’ aspirations.

Sissi’s remarks come on the first day of a truce between Israel and Hamas, to be accompanied by the release of 50 Israeli hostages abducted on October 7 by Hamas, in return for the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.