Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Sergey Lavrov visited Israel on February 15-16. He had meetings with Israeli President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Acting Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu.

The central theme of the talks was a detailed examination of matters relating to developments around the Gaza Strip and to the Arab-Israeli settlement as a whole. There was reaffirmed on the Russian side a position in favor of establishing a stable ceasefire on the basis of the full implementation of UN Security Council resolution 1860 and the safeguarding of security for civilian Israelis and Palestinians. The special importance was noted of uninterrupted supplies to the Gaza Strip of food, medicine and items of first necessity to remedy the crisis situation there.

During the talks, preparations for a Moscow Middle East Meeting were substantively discussed that are currently being transferred onto a practical plane in the interest of resuming the peace process in the Middle East.

In discussing bilateral relations, the opinion was reaffirmed that cooperation between Russia and Israel in different fields is dynamically evolving and acquiring a new quality and is not subject to conjunctural fluctuations.