Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was invited by Israel’s Defense Minister Benny Gantz for a rare meeting to discuss security coordination and preventing ongoing violence and acts of terrorism.
Following the meeting, Gantz’s office said he approved “confidence-building measures,” including the transfer of tax payments to the Palestinian Authority, the authorization of hundreds of permits for Palestinian merchants and VIPs, and approving residency status for thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Abbas met with Gantz at his private residence in a Tel Aviv suburb on Dec. 28. The meeting marked the first time the Palestinian leader held talks with a senior Israeli official on Israeli territory in over a decade.
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is one of the world’s most enduring conflicts, but the Dec. 28 negotiations made no mention of a peace process.
The government of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has shown no interest in reviving peace talks, which broke down more than a decade ago, but has said it wants to reduce tensions by improving living conditions in the West Bank. Recent months have seen a surge in violence by Palestinians attacking Israelis in east Jerusalem and the West Bank, as well as Israelis attacking Palestinians in the West Bank.
Isaac Herzog, the president of Israel, said he believes the Dec. 28 dialogue was “positive,” adding that the meeting itself was important “at a time when we are security challenged in Judea and Samaria”—which is commonly referred to as the West Bank.
“We need to find paths for dialogue with the neighboring people in any way that can improve the lives of all of us and all the peoples, and certainly integrate into the impressively evolving regional fabric,” Herzog said on Dec. 29.
In a separate incident, less than a day after Abbas met with Gantz, an Israeli civilian was wounded by gunfire in an attack on the Gaza border, the military said. The attack was the first instance of cross-border violence along the border of the Palestinian enclave in months and comes as Abbas drew condemnation from the enclave’s Hamas rulers for his visit to Israel.
The Israeli military said it responded with tank fire at multiple Hamas terrorist positions in the Gaza Strip. No group has immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.
“This is an attack on the uprising taking place in the West Bank,” said Hazim Qasim, a spokesperson for the designated terrorist group—apparently referring to a spate of recent attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilians.
The Palestinians seek an independent state that includes all of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. Hamas seized Gaza from Abbas’s forces in 2007, a year after the terrorist group won a landslide victory in parliamentary elections. Gaza has been under an Israeli–Egyptian blockade since then.
