CAIRO: The Arab League on Sunday urged countries to boycott an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development tourism conference to be hosted by Israel in the disputed city of Jerusalem this week.
"The Arab League views with extreme concern the holding of the OECD tourism conference in Jerusalem," a senior official of the Cairo-based League, Mohamed Sobeih, told journalists.
"Israel takes advantage of such events to try to convince public opinion there has been a favorable response to its ideas that are hostile to peace and to its practices which pose a real obstacle to peace," he said.
Sobeih, deputy secretary general for Palestinian affairs, said the Arab League has sent letters to foreign ministers, especially from Europe, urging a boycott the Oct. 21-22 conference.
The forum has already led to a row between the OECD and Israel, which only joined the organization in May.
Israeli Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov said the choice of Jerusalem amounted to recognition of the Jewish state’s claim to the city as its capital, a statement which sparked a protest from OECD secretary general Angel Gurria.
Israel seized east Jerusalem in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed it in a move not recognized by the international community or the Palestinians, who consider it the capital of their promised state.
Israel considers all of Jerusalem to be its "eternal and indivisible" capital, a claim not recognized by the international community.
