Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has invited Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi to visit Israel, saying the was encouraged by the president’s recent comments on the peace treaty between the two countries.
Morsi was quoted on Tuesday as saying that the peace treaty with Israel will remain intact, but refrained from saying whether he would agree to meet any Israeli leaders.
He said Egypt would adopt a "balanced" foreign policy in order to safeguard its interests.
"Those who speak of peace and stability must realize that it cannot be a hypothetical peace," Lieberman said during a conference.
"We certainly hope to see Morsi hosting official Israeli representatives soon; we want to see him giving interviews to Israeli media; we want to see him in Jerusalem as President Shimon Peres’s ' guest," the Israeli Foreign Minister said.
But a senior official in Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood’s ruling party said Wednesday the president is unlikely to accept Lieberman's invitation.
He the invitation of President Morsi to Israel as "diplomatic rebelliousness." He stressed that "there is no possibility for Morsi to visit the Zionist entity."
In an article published by Egyptian online magazine al-Wafd, Gamal Heshmat said that "accepting Israel's invitation would be unimaginable."
He noted that even ousted president Hosni Mubarak only visited Israel once, to attend Yitzhak Rabin's funeral, despite the fact he considered Israel a "strategic asset."
"If Mubarak never held such a visit, how could Morsi do it?" he said.
Morsi, who is currently in Tehran where he attends the summit of the 120- nation Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), will travel in September to the US, which gives the Egyptian military $1.3 billion in annual aid.

EJP