Saturday 12 / April / 2025
Washington: US Secretary of State John Kerry warned on Wednesday that the future of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was in jeopardy, and laid out parameters for future peace talks, saying the United States could not stay silent.
In a speech just weeks before the Obama administration hands over power to President-elect Donald Trump, Kerry defended the US decision to allow the passage of a UN resolution last week demanding an end to Israeli settlements, saying it was intended to preserve the possibility of a two-state solution.
"Despite our best efforts over the years, the two-state solution is now in serious jeopardy," Kerry said in a speech at the State Department.
"We cannot, in good conscience, do nothing, and say nothing, when we see the hope of peace slipping away."
"The truth is that trends on the ground - violence, terrorism, incitement, settlement expansion and the seemingly endless occupation - are destroying hopes for peace on both sides and increasingly cementing an irreversible one-state reality that most people do not actually want."
Kerry's parting words are unlikely to change anything on the ground between Israel and the Palestinians or salvage the Obama administration's record of failed Middle East peace efforts.
His impassioned speech comes less than a week after the United States abstained in the December 23 UN resolution, in what many see as a parting shot by US President Barack Obama who had an acrimonious relationship with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Trump, who has vowed to pursue more pro-Israeli policies, had urged the United States to veto.
Israel approved construction of a multi-storey building for settlers in annexed East Jerusalem on Wednesday, an NGO said, after postponing authorisation of hundreds of other homes.
US President-elect Donald Trump has joined Israeli leaders in attacking the outgoing Obama administration's move at the UN.
"We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect. They used to have a great friend in the US, but not anymore," Trump, a Republican, wrote in a new Twitter posting.
"Stay strong Israel, January 20th is fast approaching!, Trump said, citing the day he takes office.
A Jerusalem municipal committee pulled back from approving 492 new homes for Israelis in occupied East Jerusalem, an area that Israel captured along with the occupied West Bank in the 1967 war.
The chairman of the committee and one of its members said Netanyahu had asked for the vote to be delayed, concerned approval for those projects would add ammunition to anti-settlement arguments.
A spokesman for the Israeli leader declined to make immediate comment. The panel meets regularly and the building projects that were removed from the agenda on Wednesday could come up for a vote in the future.
Ir Amim, a group which opposes Israeli settlement in occupied territory where Palestinians seek to establish a state, said the committee nonetheless permitted construction of a four-storey building for settlers in Silwan, a Palestinian neighbourhood where they have been expanding their enclave.
"Today, while attention has been focused on the removal of... building permits... the committee proceeded to approve a controversial project in one of the most flammable neighbourhoods in occupied East Jerusalem," Ir Amim said in a statement.
Saeb Erekat, secretary-general of the Palestine Liberation Organization, called on Israel "to take the high ground and declare a cessation of settlement activities, including occupied East Jerusalem, so we can give the peace process the chance it deserves by the resumption of meaningful negotiations".
Washington considers the settlement activity illegitimate and most countries view it as an obstacle to peace. Israel cites a historical and political connection to the land - which the Palestinians also claim - as well as security interests.
Some 570,000 Israelis now live in the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem amid mounting international concern that a two-state solution to the dispute is in jeopardy, with peace talks stalled since 2014.
Netanyahu's aides are confident Trump's incoming administration will likely ignore any Obama principles. Trump has pledged to move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to occupied Jerusalem, which Israel claims as its capital - a status that is not recognised internationally.
"Who's Obama? He's history," Israeli Culture Minister Miri Regev said on Army Radio on Wednesday.
Reuters
