Disclosure of the details of the meeting of a Palestinian minister and the foreign minister of Israel, What is the story?

In an interview with the Israeli Walla website, the Palestinian Minister of Civil Affairs revealed the details of his meeting with the Israeli Foreign Minister, while Hamas criticized the meeting, saying that it "reflects the state of the national downfall that the authority has reached."

A Hebrew website revealed on Tuesday evening the contents of a meeting two days ago between Palestinian Minister of Civil Affairs Hussein Al-Sheikh and Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid.

In an interview with Walla (an exclusive Israeli website), Sheikh said that his meeting with Lapid "was very positive and opened the door to increasing contacts between Israel and the Palestinians."

He added, "We want this door to remain open to move forward in the future, to resume negotiations as well," according to the same source.

Since 2014, the peace process between the Palestinian and Israeli sides has stalled, due to Israel's refusal to stop settlements and its repudiation of the principle of the "two-state solution".

The meeting between Lapid and Sheikh took place on Sunday evening at the first house in Tel Aviv (central) and lasted about an hour, for the first time since the Israeli minister took office last June, according to the Hebrew website.

The sheikh said that during the meeting he conveyed a message to Lapid from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, in which the latter expressed his belief "in the possibility of reaching a political solution with Israel through negotiations, and sees great importance for a political horizon between Israel and the Palestinians."

And the sheikh added, "I made it clear to Minister Lapid that it is important to have a political horizon between us and the Israelis, It is true that we are talking about security, economic and civil matters, but it is important to have a political umbrella for everything we do, and without that the situation will be very difficult."

He noted that Lapid informed him that Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett knew of the meeting, and he did not oppose it.

The Palestinian official confirmed that Lapid expressed his support for Defense Minister Benny Gantz's measures to strengthen the Palestinian Authority.

"We also discussed some other political issues, but I do not want to go into details," he said, noting that he had raised with Lapid "the issue of violent settlers' attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank."

In the same context, he added, "Lapid also raised the issue of the Palestinian lawsuit against Israel at the International Criminal Court in The Hague."

In May 2018, Palestine formally submitted a request to refer the file of Israeli war crimes against the Palestinian people to the International Criminal Court.

The Palestinian minister indicated that he also discussed with Lapid "the state of the ruling coalition in Israel, political developments within the Palestine Liberation Organization, the situation in the Arab world, and relations with the United States."

The Sheikh added, "There was a positive meeting that could be built upon, and we agreed to hold follow-up meetings."

The Israeli Foreign Minister's office did not comment on Sheikh's statements to the Hebrew website.

And on Sunday evening, the sheikh said in a tweet on Twitter: "This evening I met with Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid," without specifying the location of the meeting.

He continued, "We discussed several political and bilateral issues, and stressed the need for a political horizon between the two parties based on international legitimacy."​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

He added, "The continuation of these absurd meetings with the leaders of the occupation is a betrayal of the sacrifices of our people."