In Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia foreign minister Syed Hamid Albar said Muslim countries shouldn't be too quick to embrace Israel following its Gaza pullout, which is merely "a small step" toward establishing an independent state for the Palestinians.

Pakistani opposition groups were to hold street rallies across the country on Friday to condemn the first formal talks between Pakistan and Israel, which critics said were a step toward diplomatic recognition of the Jewish state.

"We urge the people to fully participate in today's rallies to tell the rulers that we will not allow them to recognise Israel," said Ameer ul-Azeem, spokesman for Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), an opposition coalition of six Islamic parties on Friday.

He made his comments a day after Pakistani Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri met his Israeli counterpart Silvan Shalom in Istanbul, Turkey.

Azeem also criticised Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf for arranging Thursday's meeting without consulting Parliament, and for planning to send a delegation to al-Quds (Jerusalem). Pakistan has not announced a date for the visit.

Lack of consultation

Pakistani lawmakers walked out of parliament in protest of the meeting with Israel.

Opposition lawmakers from the Islamic coalition staged a walkout of the lower house of parliament to condemn the government for not consulting them before sending Kasuri to Turkey for talks with the Israeli foreign minister.

"Only one individual (Musharraf) took this decision. We condemn it," said Hafiz Hussain Ahmed, deputy chief of MMA.

After Thursday's landmark meeting, Musharraf told reporters that the government had made no decision to establish formal ties with Israel.

"Pakistan will not recognise Israel until the establishment of a free and independent state for the Palestinian people," he said, adding that Thursday's meeting "does not mean that we have recognised Israel".

Anger

Musharraf, has angered Pakistani opposition groups by calling for a debate on whether Pakistan should recognise the Jewish state, and has courted further criticism by agreeing to speak at a Jewish interfaith conference in New York later this month.

However, Pakistan officials have said there are no plans for Musharraf to meet Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon when they are in New York to attend the UN General Assembly meeting.

On Friday, Israel said that talk of a possible meeting between Sharon and Musharraf was premature.
"We have to examine carefully how the issue is received by public opinion in Pakistan," Ron Prosor, director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, told Israel Army Radio. "We have to build this the way we have built the meeting so far."

Malaysian caution

In Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian foreign minister on Friday announced that Muslim majority countries shouldn't be too quick to embrace Israel following its Gaza pullout, which is merely "a small step" toward establishing an independent state for the Palestinians.

Malaysia, which chairs the world's largest Muslim political grouping, has no immediate plan to establish formal ties with Israel, Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar said in response to the meeting between the foreign ministers of Israel and Pakistan.

"It is not wrong for any nation to have interaction with Israel's foreign minister to convey the desire of Muslim nations to see the establishment of a Palestinian state," Syed Hamid told reporters.

Small step

"But we shouldn't simply consider that the problems in that region have been solved because of the Gaza pullout, which is a small step," he added.

Syed Hamid, whose country chairs the 57-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference, stressed that Israel "needs to take many more steps to turn a free and independent Palestinian state into a reality".

"We welcome the steps to open the door to peace, but the road to peace remains a long way," Syed Hamid said. "In all this excitement in welcoming the Gaza withdrawal, we must not forget that the final goal is to form a viable Palestinian state."

Israel currently has diplomatic relations with several Muslim majority states: Turkey, Jordan, Egypt, Mauritania and former Soviet republics in central Asia.

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