Special report: Palestine-Israel Relations

    DAMASCUS, March 29 (Xinhua) -- Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Saturday slammed Israel for its military offensive in Palestinian Gaza Strip, saying the security could not be achieved by wars.

    "The Israeli understanding of security can never be achieved because the Israeli occupation of the Arab territories contradicts with peace and security," al-Assad said, while delivering his speech at the opening session of the 20th Arab Summit.

    "If security is not mutual, it will be just illusive and not existed," al-Assad asserted.

    He, meanwhile, justified the Palestinian resistance movement, saying "resisting the occupation was legalized by all international conventions."

    "If wars and occupations were the most serious issues that we had faced within the last decades, the battle for peace wasn't less important. We realize how important peace is for a long time," he added.

    He announced in his speech that all Arab countries "have the intention together to achieve peace in the region, only if Israel expresses readiness for it."

    As to the Lebanese political crisis, which Syria was accused of meddling, al-Assad said that the key of the solution of the Lebanese crisis "is in the hands of the Lebanese people who have their homeland, their constitution and establishments."

    He added that there has been a pressure exerted on Syria for more than one year "to interfere into the internal Lebanese affairs, but we say that we are ready to cooperate with any Arab or non-Arab efforts to end the crisis there."