Israel PM refuses to meet Norway’s FM

Israeli caretaker Prime Minister Yair Lapid has refused to meet Norwegian Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt over the Nordic country’s labelling of settlement products.

Norway’s Ambassador to Israel, Kare Reidar Aas, met with Deputy Director General of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, Aliza Bin-Noun, and conveyed the request of the Norwegian minister to meet with Lapid and Israel’s foreign minister.

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Israeli news website i24News reported that Bin-Noun reminded the ambassador of Norway’s “negative moves” toward Israel, adding that  with elections coming up a meeting with Lapid would be impossible.

The Israeli news website reported that Israel was outraged in June after the Norwegian government’s decision to label food products from illegal Israeli settlements built on occupied West Bank land.

Norway said its decision keeps up with a 2019 European Court of Justice ruling which stated that food products from “Israeli-occupied areas” had to be labelled so as not to mislead the consumer about the origin of the product.