JERUSALEM: Israel's foreign ministry called in the Egyptian ambassador on Friday to stress the importance of the two countries' historic peace accord, an Israeli official said, after Egypt's prime minister said the treaty was not "sacred." Foreign Ministry Director General Rafi Barak summoned Ambassador Yasser Reda to express Israel's "irritation over the recurrent calls from senior Egyptian officials over the need for modification to the peace treaty," Ynet reported. During the 30-minute interview at the foreign ministry headquarters in Jerusalem, Barak told Reda that "from Israel's perspective, there are no intentions whatsoever to reopen the peace treaty and the step cannot be taken unilaterally." On Thursday, Sharaf said the 1979 peace deal with Israel "is not sacred" in an interview with Turkish television. "The Camp David treaty is always open to discussion or for modification if that is beneficial for the region and for a just peace. The peace treaty is not something sacred and there can be changes made to it," the official MENA agency quoted Sharaf as saying. The premier's statement comes a week after protesters ransacked the Israeli embassy in Cairo, forcing the evacuation of staff and the departure of the ambassador. Israel and Egypt fought four major wars in which tens of thousands lost their lives before they signed the 1979 treaty, ushering in more than three decades of relative calm. Relations between Egypt and Israel, strained since the ousting of former president Hosni Mubarak in February, were plunged into crisis last Saturday when protesters in Cairo stormed the Jewish state's embassy, forcing most of its diplomats to flee Egypt. A cross-border attack last month has also frayed ties between the two states, with Israeli forces killing six Egyptian security guards during gun battles with Palestinian militants, who had earlier ambushed and killed eight Israelis.
