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Anshel Pfeffer

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Anshel Pfeffer,

anshel pfeffer

Analysis

Purim dispute aside, Putin reassures Bibi

Mr Netanyahu assured his Russian counterpart that Israel was not interested in intervening in Syrian politics

March 21, 2017 12:02
Russian President Vladimir Putin and  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu together at a previosu meeting in 2015
1 min read

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin last Thursday in Moscow seems to have been overshadowed by reports on the contemporary meaning of Purim.

Three days before the festival, Mr Netanyahu chose to highlight the fact that the Jews still commemorate a 2,500-year-old plot to exterminate them and that “today there is an attempt by Persia’s heir, Iran, to destroy the state of the Jews”.

Mr Putin responded: “We now live in a different world. Let us talk about that now.”

While the accounts of the exchange between them have created the impression that the results of the meeting were unsatisfactory, Mr Netanyahu retuned to Israel with the conclusion that the Russian president remains sympathetic to Israel’s security concerns.