The Foreign Minister of Russia Sergey Lavrov granted a lengthy interview to RT on Nov. 15 which focused largely on Southwest Asia. He stated that Russia believes the “absolutely necessary first step” is to stop hostilities in Gaza and resolve pressing humanitarian problems. He reviewed the recent efforts to get a binding statement issued by the UN Security Council calling for a ceasefire, “but the Americans are not going, at least as things stand now, they are not going to let anything move forward except `a humanitarian pause’ with no commitment to do something else after a one-time action…. Washington doesn’t want to tie Israel’s hands. It works with the Israelis, I know this, and tries to persuade them to be a little flexible regarding the supply of humanitarian goods, medicines, other stuff necessary for hospitals’ functioning, and also be flexible for letting the foreigners out of Gaza. But the key reason, I believe, is that Washington doesn’t want this [war] to stop in any way which Israel doesn’t like.”
Lavrov emphasized that there is also an absolutely necessary second step, “which is much more important: the creation of the Palestinian state is unavoidable.” He reviewed the history of Russia’s fight for this in the UN over decades.
RT then asked him about those who suggest that, if the U.S. attacks Iran, “Moscow will then lend support to Tehran.”
Lavrov went out of his way to call this whole scenario a provocation, and repeat various times that neither Iran, nor Hezbollah, nor anyone else on the Arab side wants to expand the war.
