Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has expressed confidence in Egypt's commitment to peace with Israel after the ransacking of the Jewish state's Cairo embassy shook the shifting foundations of the brittle relationship with its first Muslim ally.
The outpouring of public hostility towards Israel in demonstrations on Saturday forced the evacuation of its ambassador from Egypt on the same day and strained ties between two countries locked in what Israelis have long described as a "cold peace".
The new crisis with Egypt, whose toppled president, Hosni Mubarak, kept anti-Israel protests in check to protect massive US aid, erupted only a week after Turkey expelled Israel's envoy in a dispute over a 2010 Israeli raid on a Gaza aid flotilla that killed nine Turks.
Netanyahu, echoing remarks he made on Saturday, told his cabinet that Israel was in contact with Egyptian authorities about returning the Israeli ambassador to Cairo and the security arrangements necessary to protect him and his staff.
"Those who rip down flags ... they are negating peace and the country," Netanyahu said in public comments at the session.
"I am glad there are other forces in Egypt, including the Egyptian government, that are interested in advancing the cause of peace."
In protracted scenes of violence that began on Friday and raged into the early hours of Saturday, crowds stormed the Israeli embassy, besieging a six-man Israeli security detail.
Israeli leaders, and banner headlines in the Israeli media, described the public fury towards the Jewish state as an attack on the 1979 Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty.
"We will stick to it," Netanyahu said, referring to the first accord between an Arab country and Israel to be signed.
But the events in Cairo have deepened Israeli concern about Egypt's "Arab Spring".
"What began with Western [liberal democracy] slogans - will it end in Islam, dictatorship or democracy? All of that is still completely open," Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor said on Israel radio.
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