Assistant Minister for Treasury and Finance Zed Seselja says he is “certainly favourably disposed towards” moving the Australian embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.
Senator Seselja said the decision was outside of his responsibility and that it would be “a process that is going to go through national security cabinet” processes.
The comments come after Josh Frydenberg launched a forceful pitch for the government to follow through with moving its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem, despite a regional backlash and domestic pressure to influence Scott Morrison’s review.
“It goes to our values,” Senator Seselja said. We want to see a two state solution. This in no way undermines the two state solution,” he said.
“When you’ve got a stalled peace process you do need to look at how to do things differently,” he said.
Trade Minister Simon Birmingham says the government will consider the economic and security implications of moving the Australian embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, citing the two-state solution as the “number one” objective for Middle East policies.
Senator Birmingham also said he is hopeful the Indonesia free trade agreement will be signed “in the coming months”, after the Israel embassy announcement threatened to stall the bilateral trade agreement with the South East Asian nation.
Read the article by Michael Roddan in The Australian.