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Israeli PM says relations with EU are "back on track"

Xinhua, February 14, 2016 Adjust font size:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday Israel has resolved its differences with the European Union after three-month diplomatic tensions over the bloc's decision to label West Bank settlement exports.

Netanyahu told the cabinet that he and the EU's foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini talked on the phone during the weekend. "Israel and the European Union have agreed to put relations between us back on track," he said.

Netanyahu noted the decision was made after Mogherini assured him the EU objects boycotts on Israel and that the labeling of settlement products will not be mandatory.

In a statement released on Mogherini's behalf on Friday, she reiterated the EU's commitment to a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, adding that the final borders of Israel and the future Palestinian state should "be settled in direct negotiations between the parties."

On November 29, Israel suspended contacts with the EU on diplomatic relations regarding the peace process with the Palestinians, following the 28-country bloc's decision to label products from Jewish settlements in territories occupied by Israel as such.

Israel seized these territories during the 1967 Mideast War, and later annexed the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, in a move never recognized by the international community.

The West Bank settlements are illegal under international law and the international community opposes them, saying their construction undermine prospects of establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel. Endit