Report: Two Israeli delegations postpone visits to Qatar

The French "Top Urgent " news bulletin reported that the Qatari authorities informed the Israeli government on December 7 of its wish to postpone the visit of two Israeli delegations which were expected to arrive in Qatar on December 17.

The bulletin said that Qatari Foreign Minister Hamad Bin Jasem al-Jaber phoned the Israeli side asking for the postponement of the visit until the end of February 1999 because of Doha's involvement in preparations for the Gulf summit and the coming of the holy month of Ramadan, immediately after the end of the summit, a matter which makes conditions improper for the visit of the Israeli economic and security delegations to Qatar.

The news bulletin, which is distributed only among subscribers, said the economic delegation would seek to discuss joint oil and gas projects, whereas the security delegation was on a mission to open channels of communication with Qatari security forces and to exchange information.

The bulletin reported that relations with Israel occupied a large part of the interventions of the recent GCC summit held in Abu Dhabi, adding that the Saudi delegation asked Doha and Muscat to freeze normalization with Israel in the meantime due to the complications which face the peace process and the stumbled US efforts to relaunch it.

The bulletin added that the Saudi delegation urged the two capitals to await developments in order to know the direction of regional conditions before starting any new strides.