Chadian President Idriss Deby promised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his official meeting on Sunday to mediate to improve Israel’s relations with African countries, including Sudan, to enable Israeli aviation to use African routes.
Deby expressed his optimism that these countries would respond to Israel’s demand to activate a direct flight line, from Latin America to Tel Aviv through African airspace, which would shorten the flight by three hours.
In parallel, he said that the growing terrorist activity in the Middle East “is pushing for an alliance between the Arab countries that are exposed to terrorism and Israel.”
Deby arrived in Tel Aviv on Sunday for a first official visit by a senior Chadian official to the country in 46 years.
In a joint press conference following their meeting, Netanyahu said that the bilateral talks dealt with the “changes that have taken place in the Arab world’s dealings with Israel, which were translated into my visit to Oman, which will be followed by other visits close to Arab countries very soon.”
He continued: “Chad is an important African country for Israel. In the past two years, I have been in Africa three times, in the East and the West. I hope to get to the center of Africa with you and bring with me Israeli businessmen and large companies, to make every effort to improve the living conditions” in the continent.
Deby, for his part, said: “The current visit reflects our intention to pursue the contacts that were underway behind the scenes. We want to enter into a new era of cooperation and renewal of diplomatic relations.”
Commenting on the Palestinian Cause, he noted: “Of course, our diplomatic relations, which I personally welcome, are not something that will ignore or conceal the Palestinian cause; I myself have declared at the United Nations on more than one occasion my country’s desire to reach a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. We believe that this peace must reflect the principles of the Security Council, the Arab League and the Madrid principles, in addition to the bilateral agreements between the two parties.”
