Epress.am News from Armenia
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has made his first public comment on the French bill on criminalization of denial of the Armenian Genocide.
In an interview with television channel RTVi, Lieberman publicly spoke out against Israel recognizing the massacres of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey as genocide.
Furthermore, RTVi reported last week that Lieberman had been against the term “Holocaust” since the state was established. Attempts to turn conflicts and massacres in Africa, Asia and Balkans into another Holocaust are unacceptable, he says.
The foreign minister emphasized that history should not turn into a political dispute. Thus, Israel should not interfere, he said, Vestnik Kavkaza reported.
Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon said in May 2011 that the Israeli parliament would never recognize the Armenian Genocide, so as not to spoil relations with old strategic partner Azerbaijan over history.
He said four months later that mass murders of Armenians during WWI had been a sensitive issue, but it had not become a political problem. Ayalon added that Israel had never denied the Armenian tragedy but would not want to join the Turkish-Armenian confrontation in the issue.