2-state solution in 'serious jeopardy'

US Secretary of State John Kerry yesterday warned that Israel's building of settlements was endangering Middle East peace, expressing unusually frank frustration with the long-time American ally.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately denounced the speech as "skewed against Israel" and, according to an Israeli NGO, Jerusalem authorities authorised a new four-story block of settler homes just ahead of it.

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The Israeli PM was due to make a statement at his office in response to Kerry.

In a 70-minute speech just weeks before the Obama administration hands over to President-elect Donald Trump, Kerry said Israel "will never have true peace" with the Arab world if it does not reach an accord based on Israelis and Palestinians living in their own states.

Kerry was speaking against the backdrop of a diplomatic firestorm that was triggered last week when, on Obama's instruction, US diplomats failed to veto a UN Security Council resolution criticising Israel.

The resolution, backed unanimously by the rest of the 15 powers on the council, effectively declared Israel's settlements on areas of east Jerusalem and the West Bank beyond its 1967 border illegal.

Netanyahu, whose right-wing coalition is backed by the settler movement and who has insisted the home building is no threat to peace, was furious and accused Obama and Kerry of orchestrating the vote.

But Kerry said it had been obliged to stand up for something important. He said the “settler agenda is defining the future of Israel”.

Insisting that a two-state solution is the only way to achieve peace in Middle East, Kerry said Israel would never secure a lasting deal with Arab countries, if it opted for the one-state option.

“If the choice is one state, Israel can either be Jewish or Democratic,” he said, speaking at the State Department in Washington. “It cannot be both.”

Kerry accused Netanyahu's government of allowing Israel to slide towards a "perpetual occupation."

"Despite our best efforts over the years, the two-state solution is now in serious jeopardy," Kerry said at the State Department. "We cannot, in good conscience, do nothing, and say nothing, when we see the hope of peace slipping away."

Kerry also condemned Palestinian violence which he said included "hundreds of terrorist attacks in the past year."

His 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.

In a statement, Netanyahu said Kerry "obsessively dealt with settlements" and barely touched on "the root of the conflict - Palestinian opposition to a Jewish state in any boundaries."

The Israelis are looking past Obama and expect they will receive more favorable treatment from Trump, who takes office on Jan 20. The Republican used his Twitter account yesterday to denounce the Obama administration, including its UN vote and the nuclear accord it reached with Iran last year.

"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 said in a series of tweets. "Stay strong Israel, January 20th is fast approaching!"

Trump had openly lobbied against the UN resolution and would be expected to veto any further ones deemed anti-Israel.

He has vowed to move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and has appointed as ambassador a lawyer who raised money for a major Jewish settlement, has cast doubt on the idea of a two-state solution and even advocated for Israel's annexation of the West Bank, a notion even further to the right than Netanyahu's own stance.

Kerry vigorously defended the UN resolution and rejected criticism "that this vote abandons Israel."

"It is not this resolution that is isolating Israel. It is the permanent policy of settlement construction that risks making peace impossible."

"The vote in the UN was about preserving the two-state solution," he declared.

In a pointed reply to Netanyahu who said last week that "Friends don't take friends to the Security Council," and who has insisted the Obama administration had orchestrated the resolution, Kerry hit back, saying: "Friends need to tell each other the hard truths, and friendships require mutual respect."

Kerry defended Obama's commitment to Israel's security and US support for Israel in international platforms. Earlier this year, the United States and Israel agreed a $38 billion in military assistance over the next decade.

Kerry warned the "settler agenda" was leading Israeli policy and imperiling prospects for peace.

"Trends indicate a comprehensive effort to take West Bank land for Israel and prevent any Palestinian development there."

And Kerry added: "The settler agenda is defining the future of Israel. And their stated purpose is clear: They believe in one state: greater Israel."

Some observers questioned the speech's "curious" timing.

"A speech of this gravity really should have been delivered before such a permanent move as the Security Council resolution, rather than after," scholar Jonathan Schanzer told AFP.

Ilan Goldenberg of the Center for a New American Security was more supportive of Kerry's goals in the speech, but he also noted: "It would have been better two years ago."

Kerry, he suggested, was attempting to lay down the framework for a peace process that might bear fruit before Trump arrives in office and radically changes the US position.