Israeli FM: Iran is our first foreign policy issue

The expected vote on Palestinian statehood at the United Nations in September is "important but not so important," said Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman at the second day of the World Jewish Congress's Board of Governors in Jerusalem.

While eyes have turned towards the possibility that a Palestinian state may be recognized at the UN, Lieberman warned that Iran has continued to advance its nuclear program defying the international community.

"The international community has forgotten about the Iranian issue and their desire to achieve nuclear capability," he said. "It is clear they are no longer trying to conceal and doing everything that can to achieve the capability."

The hawkish leader of the Yisrael Beiteinu party said the government was willing to restart negotiations with Palestinians at any time without precondition despite what he called a "fully-fledged smear campaign" its leadership was carrying out against Israel.

On the issue of the tumult in the Arab world, Liberman said he hoped to see successful democratic change take root in the region.

"Egypt, our biggest neighbor, is maybe our most reliable partner in the Arab world for many years since 78," he said. "We are monitoring the situation in Egypt. I wish for myself and them to see a successful, prosperous and democratic society."

Earlier on Monday the World Jewish Congress officially voted in Dan Diker, a former think tank analyst and journalist, to the position of its new secretary general.

"We will remind the world of the principles that the WJC has worked hard to defend," Diker said after his election. "The scourge of anti-Israeli sentiment is merely the new politically correct form of anti-Semitism."

Diker replaced Michael Schneider, the former vice president of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, who decided to step down from the position he held since 2007.

At the opening dinner on the first day of the gathering on Sunday WJC, President Ronald Lauder welcomed 250 WJC delegates from around the world as well as dignitaries including President Shimon Peres, former Uruguay president Luis Alberto Lacalle and former Peruvian president Alejandro Toledo.

Unlike Lieberman, he said he believed the upcoming vote at the UN was the most pressing issue Israel faces in the diplomatic sphere today.

"Most important is what is going to happen when they vote in September for a two state solution but for recognition of a Palestinian State," Lauder said. "It may be difficult for Israel but the key to Israel is the indomitable spirit of the country and its will to succeed and for us looking from the Diaspora we can only look with amazement."

During the gathering tycoon Nochi Danker was awarded the 2011 Herzl award. The Jewish organization said the prize went to Danker, who recently added the Hebrew-language newspaper Maariv to the long list of companies in his possessions, for his activism and philanthropy.

Source: The Jerusalem Post