Speakers firmly committed

From left to right: Mr. Avraham Burg, Speaker of the Knesset, Mr. Raymond Forni, Speaker of the French National Assembly and Mr. Ahmed Qoreï "Abu Ala", Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council..

Once again, the Middle East is high on the agenda. The situation that has darkened the region in which the three monotheistic religions were born occupied the attention of the world's parliamentarians gathered in Marrakech for the 107th IPU Conference. The key question was: can parliamentarians help to stop the violence, both random and intentional, that continues to cause civilian deaths on both the Israeli and the Palestinian sides?

The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and many Speakers of parliaments of the European Union (EU) believe they can. The Speaker of the Knesset asserted: "the situation is what it is, but I believe that if members of parliament do not try to change it they do not fulfil their mission. And therefore if we can help, we should". The Deputy-Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) Ibrahim Abu Al-Naja commented that: "parliamentarians might to some extent influence the decisions of their governments, but effectively it is the executive branch that has the final decision".

Aware of this twofold reality, the Committee on Middle East Questions, chaired by French MP Yves Tavernier, convened a meeting of the Israeli and Palestinian delegations in Marrakech, in the presence of the President of the Egyptian Parliament and two Jordanian delegates in order to continue to promote the dialogue which Knesset President Avraham Burg and PLC Speaker Ahmed Qoreï "Abu Ala" started and have never interrupted despite the almost total absence of communication between their respective government leaders and the two peoples.

In order to support the political courage demonstrated by Avraham Burg and Ahmed Qoreï, their European colleagues led by Raymond Forni, the Speaker of the French National Assembly, who was subsequently replaced by Pierferdinando Casini, Speaker of Italy's House of Representatives, decided to accompany their counterpart from the Knesset who had been invited by the PLC Speaker to go to Ramallah as soon as possible. In supporting the determination of Mr Burg and Mr Qoreï and of the Israeli and Palestine parliamentarians who are continuing to talk to each other despite the violence, the IPU and the European Speakers of Parliaments are voicing a message of hope not only to the Israeli and Palestinian peoples but also to the Jewish, Muslim, Christian and other citizens who have been demonstrating for peace in several countries. "In Israel like in Palestine, there are men of peace who are driven by the same will and who share the same goal of living in peace in two separate States, because it is in their interest and in the interest of the international community at large" said Raymond Forni.

It is true that those words were said before the attack against Israeli citizens on the Jewish feast day of Pessah and before the Israeli army drove into the towns under Palestinian control and besieged the headquarters of the President of the Palestinian Authority who was isolated in Ramallah for one month, but the determination of the parliamentarians who spoke them is as strong as ever. As the Speaker of the House of Representatives of Morocco, who chaired the proceedings of the 107th Inter-Parliamentary Conference said "the only possible solution is a negotiated one". With this in mind, the IPU has once again expressed its readiness to organise a meeting between the Presidents of the Knesset and the Palestinian Legislative Council as soon as possible.