Haaretz. Under the pressure of Azerbaijan, the issue of recognition of the Armenian Genocide was removed from the Knesset agenda

According to an Israeli source, Prime Minister Netanyahu blocked the vote after Hikmet Hajiyev, a senior adviser to the President of Azerbaijan, contacted his office.

Haaretz has learned that the Israeli government has since informed Azerbaijani officials that the issue has been removed from the Knesset agenda and therefore will not be included in the series of votes held before the summer recess.

In response to a Haaretz inquiry, Saar’s office denied that the vote was canceled as a result of Netanyahu’s intervention, but offered no other explanation as to why it was not put up for discussion in the Knesset.

“There is a government decision (recognizing the genocide) and it was adopted unanimously,” Saar said in a statement. “It will not change, and that is the important and historical fact.”

The newspaper writes that although the issue was ultimately not put to a vote in the Knesset, last week Azerbaijan sent another signal that may indicate a certain cooling of relations with Israel. Aliyev received Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa in Baku.

The official statement also noted that Azerbaijan continues to support the Palestinians, including through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office and Hikmet Hajiyev, political adviser to the Azerbaijani president, did not respond to Haaretz’s requests for comment.

In a conversation with Ynet, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced last month that he supports the Armenian Genocide recognition project.

The Israeli government unanimously approved the project presented by Foreign Minister Gideon Saar to officially recognize the Armenian Genocide.

“It is never too late to do the right thing,” noted Foreign Minister Gideon Saar and added. “This terrible genocide, which took place more than 100 years ago and whose historical facts are truly indisputable, involved the killing of one and a half million people and the destruction of ancient cultural and historical heritage.”

The next day, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan criticized the Israeli government’s decision to recognize the Armenian Genocide and called for its review.

Referring to the non-reaction of the Israeli government to the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in response to the question of “Freedom”. “We don’t see the need for a reaction, because we think that not getting into the issue of weaponization of the Armenian Genocide is in the interests of the Republic of Armenia.”