Egypt, January 05: Exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal has assured Saudi Arabia his movement is loyal to Arab states, the kingdom’s foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, said on Tuesday.
“I asked Khaled Meshaal whether the movement stood with Arabs or with others,” Prince Saud said, referring to Iran, a strong regional backer of Hamas, the democratically elected Palestinian movement ruling in Israeli-besieged Gaza.
“Meshaal insisted that Hamas was an Arab movement and that the Palestinian question was an Arab issue,” the Saudi minister said at the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh after talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
The exchange between Prince Saud and Meshaal occurred on Sunday during a visit by the Hamas leader to Saudi Arabia.
Prince Saud’s visit to Egypt is part of a string of regional meetings aimed at reviving peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, which have been stalled for a year.
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and Jordan’s King Abdullah II were in Egypt on Monday for talks with Mubarak, a week after a visit by hardline Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
On Sunday in Riyadh, Meshaal said Egyptian-led talks aimed at reconciling the Palestinian democratically elected movement and its rival Fatah were close to bearing fruit.
US President Barack Obama has repeatedly called on Israel and the Palestinians to resume peace talks.
The Palestinians have insisted the borders of their promised independent state encompass all of their land Israel illegally occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem — which Israel later annexed in a move not recognised by the international community — as their capital.
—Agencies