Former US Secretary of State, John Kerry, launched another attack on Israel by claiming that the government in Tel Aviv has no interest in fostering peace with the Palestinians.
The comments made by the former US presidential hopeful came to light in a recording published by Israeli Channel 10 yesterday in which Kerry praises the Palestinians for showing “extraordinary” restraint against Israeli provocations.
“The Palestinians have done an extraordinary job of remaining committed to non-violence. And in fact when the intifada (2015) took place they delivered non-violence – in the West Bank,” said Kerry.
“This is overlooked by the general [Israeli] populations because it is not a topic of discussion,” Kerry continued. “Why? Because the majority of the cabinet currently in the Israeli government has publicly declared they are not ever for a Palestinian state.”
Kerry intimated that the concessions made in the name of Israeli security have done nothing to end the Israeli occupation and predicted that the Palestinian struggle will evolve into a civil rights movement.
Describing the steps taken to safeguard Israel’s security he mentioned that “King Abdullah of Jordan accepted the idea of having Israeli troops at an airport in Jordan”.
“We even have pre-deployment of weapons in the West Bank in the event there was an existential threat to Israel that they would have to respond to,” added Kerry.
Frustrated by the lack of progress Kerry said: “If you see 40,000 kids marching up to the wall every day with signs saying ‘give us our rights’, I mean I don’t think Palestine is going to be immune forever to the civil rights movements that have swept other nations in the world and somehow Israel is ignoring this. That’s not leadership.”
“If you don’t have leaders who want to make peace, if the equation doesn’t change, I’ll be amazed if within the next ten years if we don’t see some young [Palestinian] leader come along who says we have tried non-violence for the last 30 years and look, it hasn’t gotten us anything.”
Kerry’s comments are in line with his speech last December, where he warned that the Middle East peace process was in jeopardy because of Israel’s reluctance to suspend settlement construction and the actions of extreme Jewish settlers.
Shortlink for this post: https://daysofpalestine.ps/?p=3461
