WASHINGTON — Members of the Islamic Ministerial Committee, headed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, met with a number of members of the US House of Representatives and Senate in Washington on Thursday. Their discussions focused mainly on stopping Israel's military aggression on the besieged Gaza Strip. Their meetings reviewed the efforts being made for an immediate ceasefire, protecting defenseless civilians, and ensuring the application of the rules of international law and international humanitarian law. The members of the committee called on the international community to take serious and urgent steps to ensure that relief corridors are secured to deliver urgent humanitarian, food and medical aid to the Gaza Strip. They stressed the importance of activating the role of parliaments and civil society institutions to stop the violations committed by the Israeli occupation authorities against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. The members of the committee underscored the importance of returning to the path of just, lasting and comprehensive peace, after the truce and ceasefire, by implementing international resolutions related to the two-state solution, and enabling the Palestinian people to obtain their legitimate rights to establish an independent and sovereign Palestinian state on the lines of June 4, 1967, with East Jerusalem as its capital. The committee members, included Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign and Expatriate Affairs Ayman Al-Safadi, and Turkish Ambassador to US Hasan Murat Mercan, who attended on behalf of the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs. The Ministerial Committee was assigned by the Joint Arab-Islamic Extraordinary Summit held in Riyadh on Nov. 11 to undertake a high-level diplomatic mission to end the conflict in Gaza. The extraordinary joint Arab-Islamic Summit issued a resolution that tasked the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Qatar, Turkey, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Palestine to initiate immediate international action, on behalf of all member states of the OIC and the Arab League, for this purpose.
