Overtures

Israel has said that it is keen on forging ties with Pakistan, which Tel Aviv did not see as an enemy but an important country in the Muslim world, media reports said.

“We are interested in normalising relations with Pakistan on the basis of equality and mutual respect”, foreign ministry spokesman Mark Regev was quoted as saying in ‘Jerusalem Post.’ “The ball is in their court.* We are ready”, Regev further said.

 

The spokesman’s comments follows a recent “accidental” meeting between Israel Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom and Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos.

 

The meeting was also followed by the publication of an interview in the ‘Jung’ of Vice Premier Shimon Peres who called upon Israel and Pakistan to have “direct, personal contact, publicly, without being ashamed about it”.

 

The office of the publication was ransacked in Karachi by unidentified gunmen the following day.

 

Shalom had also expressed his desire of establishing diplomatic ties with Pakistan, the only Muslim nuclear state, last year after Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf made overtures towards the Jewish state before his visit to Washington, the report said.

 

There were also reports of a close confidante of Musharraf paying a secret visit to Jerusalem last year to “test waters”, it said.

 

The warming up in ties then gradually died down amid strong resistance by the Islamists in Pakistan and diplomatic sources in Israel explained the move then as “playing to the Washington gallery,” it added.