BICOM

Israeli politicians responded swiftly to yesterday’s speech from the US Secretary of State in which he criticised the Israeli government for endangering the two-state solution.

Addressing the media in both Hebrew and English, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed “deep disappointment” at the speech, which he said “paid lip service to the unremitting campaign of terrorism that has been waged by the Palestinians against the Jewish state for nearly a century”.

He said “Israelis do not need to be lectured about the importance of peace by foreign leaders” as “no one wants peace more than the people of Israel”.

Netanyahu explained that direct negotiations brought “peace with Egypt; this is how we made peace with Jordan; it’s the only way we’ll make peace with the Palestinians”.

However, he asked: “How can you make peace with someone who rejects your very existence?”

He added that “the persistent Palestinian refusal to recognise a Jewish state remains the core of the conflict”.

Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said: “This speech will ensure that the Palestinians make no concessions for years to come. It distances an end to the conflict.”

Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz responded to John Kerry’s speech by saying “Kerry blames both the Israelis and Palestinians for the failure of the peace process, but takes steps that harm only the Israeli side”.

Zionist Union head and opposition leader Isaac Herzog reacted saying: “John Kerry has always been a great friend of Israel and will always be. His speech expresses true concerns about Israel’s well-being & future.”

Herzog’s Zionist Union colleague and former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Kerry had highlighted the decision facing Israelis, “a secure, Jewish and democratic Israel or a bi-national, discordant state… That is the true, and only, internal debate we must have right now: separation from the Palestinians or one state”.

Jewish Home leader Naftali Bennett also responded via social media, saying that Kerry had “good intentions but policy divorced from reality,” and that he had left the Middle East “in flames, Syrian genocide, Iran racing to bomb, Israel abandoned”.