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The nine month deadline for the US-sponsored peace talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel has passed, with no progress made in the period of intense American diplomacy. Both parties are now possibly further apart than they were before the talks started in July last year. The negotiations had started with US Secretary of State John Kerry hoping that there would be peace between both parties.
Officials have predicted that the end of the negotiations will now prompt the US to withdraw all its efforts to mediate, and both Israel and the Palestinian Authority to “minimize damage”. According to an Israeli official, “Kerry has other pressing issues he needs to deal with, including the Ukraine. I would not expect to see any diplomatic movement for months”.
After the talks ended, some ministers in the Israeli government have called for Israel to set its own international borders and annex parts of West Bank currently under Israeli control. Economy Minister Naftali Bennett said, “We will be gradually attempting to apply Israeli law on Israeli-controlled areas”. Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, accused Israel of “never giving the negotiations a chance to succeed” and using “every possible tool in order to consolidate its apartheid regime”.
“Everything Israel did during the past nine months [was] aimed at sabotaging Palestinian and international efforts to achieve the two-state solution. To build settlements in occupied land, kill Palestinians and demolish hundreds of Palestinian homes is certainly not the behavior of a government that wants to end occupation but of a government that wants to turn occupation into annexation”, Erekat said in a statement issued by the PLO.
In the midst of all the blame being exchanged, John Kerry appeared to be the only person having anything to regret. Kerry and the US have been blamed for becoming a party to the negotiations instead of guiding them. In a statement, Kerry hit back at “partisan political” attacks against him, and said that in hindsight, he would have phrased his “apartheid state” comments regarding Israel in a different manner. He added that his remarks only expressed his belief that a two-state resolution is the only way to end the conflict.
“I will not allow my commitment to Israel to be questioned by anyone, particularly for partisan, political purposes, so I want to be crystal clear about what I believe and what I don’t believe. First, Israel is a vibrant democracy and I do not believe, nor have I ever stated, publicly or privately, that Israel is an apartheid state or that it intends to become one. Second, I have been around long enough to also know the power of words to create a misimpression, even when unintentional, and if I could rewind the tape, I would have chosen a different word to describe my firm belief that the only way in the long term to have a Jewish state and two nations and two peoples living side by side in peace and security is through a two-state solution”, he said.