Israeli parliament removes “Armenian genocide” recognition issue from agenda

The issue of recognising the so-called “Armenian genocide” has been removed from the agenda of Israel’s Knesset (parliament) following pressure from Azerbaijan, Haaretz reports.

According to the newspaper, Israeli officials assured the Azerbaijani side that the matter had been excluded from the Knesset’s agenda.

One Israeli source claimed that the vote, initiated by Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, was blocked by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after Hikmet Hajiyev, Assistant to the President of Azerbaijan and head of the Foreign Policy Affairs Department of the Presidential Administration, contacted the Israeli prime minister’s office on the instructions of President Ilham Aliyev.

Haaretz noted that the Israeli government later informed Azerbaijani officials that the issue had been removed from the Knesset agenda and would therefore not be brought to a vote during the final plenary sessions before the start of the summer recess.

By Jeyhun Aghazada