TEL AVIV – Speaking to the Saban Forum in Washington, Secretary of State John Kerry demonstrated dangerous ignorance of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and a biased perception of the core problems impeding peace between the two sides.
Firstly, Kerry claimed the larger Arab world will not make peace with Israel until Israelis and Palestinians sign a deal ostensibly resulting in a Palestinian state.
“There will be no separate peace between Israel and the Arab world – I want to make that clear to all of you,” Kerry lectured, “without the Palestinian process and without Palestinian peace.”
Perhaps the esteemed diplomat forgot that Israel already signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, two moderate Arab countries that enjoy normalized relations with the Jewish state despite the absence of an Israeli-Palestinian deal.
And Kerry may have missed that under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, there have been numerous reports of security cooperation between Israel and Sunni Arab states like Saudi Arabia that are deeply concerned by the U.S.-led nuclear deal with Iran.
Kerry, meanwhile, continued the Obama administration’s singular obsession with settlement activity, believing that Jewish construction in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem serves as a major obstacle to peace. READ MORE
