Prime minister pushes to reopen Cairo embassy without delay!

TEL AVIV, Israel - September 12, 2011 -  Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu made clear Sunday that despite the weekend’s ransacking of Israel’s embassy in Cairo, the government wants to return the ambassador and his staff to Cairo as soon as possible.

Senior diplomatic officials indicated that the reason Israel wanted to see the embassy reopened so soon after the Friday and Saturday siege was a concern that the longer the return was delayed, the louder would be the voices in Egypt calling for the authorities there to bar the ambassador’s return.  There are already many in Egypt calling to follow the lead of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who will be visiting Cairo on Monday, and expel the Israeli ambassador.

Netanyahu told the cabinet at its weekly meeting on Sunday, “We are in contact with the Egyptian government regarding the necessary procedures for returning our ambassador so that he and his staff will be properly secured, so that they might continue to maintain Israel’s representation in Cairo."

The Egyptian newspaper Al- Masry Al-Youm reported that a high-level Israeli delegation consisting of four “security and political figures” arrived in Cairo on Sunday on a private jet and held talks with Egyptian officials. This report fueled speculation that one of the issues being discussed was the return of Ambassador Yitzhak Levanon, who along with some 80 other Israelis - diplomats, their families and businessmen - was flown out of the country on Saturday.