Damascus - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said on Saturday
that security in the Middle East can be only achieved through
peaceful ways, not through wars and aggression.
In a speech opening the two-day Arab summit in Syria, al-Assad
criticized Israel's understanding of security in the region.
'The Israeli understanding of security can never be achieved,as
the Israeli occupation of the Arab territories contradicts with peace
and security,' al-Assad said.
He added: 'If security is not mutual, it will be just illusive and
not present.'
The Syrian president used the word 'holocaust' to describe the
Israeli military offensive in Gaza.
'Here we are convening, while the blood of the Palestinian martyrs
who have been killed in the Israeli massacres and its holocaust
hasn't dried,' he said. 'The state-terror of Israel against our Arab
nations represents the most horrible type of terror in the modern
time.'
Assad stressed that all Arab countries have a collective intention
to achieve peace in the region, if only Israel expresses readiness
for it.
'If wars and occupations were the most serious issues that we had
faced within the last decades, the battle for peace wasn't less
important. We realize how important peace is for a long time,' the
Syrian leader said.
Concerning Beirut's political crisis, he said the Lebanese people
were the key players to end the stand-off and elect a new president.
'We are ready to cooperate with any Arab or non-Arab efforts to
end the crisis there,' Assad pledged.
A deep inter-Arab rift over Lebanon's political standoff has hit
the Syrian-hosted summit of Arab heads of state, with the leaders of
Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco and Jordan staying away and Lebanon
boycotting the meeting.
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