ROME (Reuters) – G7 major powers are working with Israel to secure a “rapid” end to its devastating war in Gaza and reduce civilian casualties, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Monday.
An Italian foreign ministry statement said Tajani had phone calls with British Foreign Secretary David Cameron and French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna and suggested “joint forms of pressure, at G7 level, on the parties involved (in the conflict) to achieve certain objectives”.
“G7 countries are working with the Israeli government to find a rapid way out of the military phase,” it quoted Tajani as saying as Italy begins its one-year presidency of the Group of Seven major industrialised powers.
One “absolute objective” is “to limit immediately the number of Palestinian civilian casualties”, and a second is “to put pressure on the Israeli government to end military operations” in Gaza, the statement said.
It said this would help revive prospects of negotiating the “difficult but unavoidable” two-state solution, under which Palestinians would win statehood in territories Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
Israel launched a massive aerial and ground offensive in Gaza with the stated aim of annihilating its ruling Palestinian Hamas movement in response to a cross-border rampage by its militants on Oct. 7.
Tajani also discussed with colleagues a rise in attacks by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi militants on commercial vessels in the Red Sea in protest against Israel’s war in Gaza.
He also voiced determination to reaffirm G7 support for Ukraine against Russia’s invasion. Kyiv, he said, should be able to “continue to count on us and on our commitment for a just and durable peace, also in view of reconstruction (efforts)”.
(Reporting by Alessandro Parodi, editing by Alvise Armellini)
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