Omani Foreign Minister Sayyid Badr Albusaidi plans to visit Palestinian Authority-controlled Ramallah in the coming weeks and is seeking to visit the Temple Mount in Jerusalem in coordination with Israeli authorities.
Albusaidi contacted the Israeli Foreign Ministry to arrange a tour of the Al-Aqsa mosque, located atop the Mount, i24NEWS reported on Monday.
Foreign Minister Eli Cohen is attempting to arrange a bilateral meeting and negotiations are underway to determine an appropriate time and place, according to the report.
In February, Oman opened its airspace to overflights by Israeli airlines, in what Cohen described as a “historic decision.”
“I thank the Sultan of Oman Haitham bin Tariq Al Said and our American friends for their substantial help in the success of the move,” said Cohen.
The announcement came after months of talks between the Foreign Ministry and authorities in Oman, and after Saudi Arabia last July announced during U.S. President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel the opening of its airspace to “all carriers,” paving the way for Israeli commercial airlines to overfly the kingdom.
In March, Cohen held a rare phone conversation with his Omani counterpart. The two men discussed matters relating to the opening of the skies and heightened tensions between Israel and the Palestinians ahead of Ramadan.
In October 2018, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made an unannounced one-day trip to Oman, where he met with then-ruler Sultan Qaboos bin Said.
The visit was a crucial step in expanding relationships with the region’s players while “leveraging Israel’s advantages in security, technology and economic matters,” Netanyahu’s office said at the time.
Oman has over the years repeatedly been named as a possible addition to the Abraham Accords, the Trump administration-brokered agreements that normalized Israel’s relations with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan.
