Secretary of State John Kerry: 12-18 months before two-state solution is ‘over’

By Noam Sheizaf April 17, 2013 | Edit

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry estimates that the two-state solution will be “over” in a year and a half. Kerry spoke at the House Foreign Affair Committee hearing on U.S. interests abroad. While many analysts have been discussing the closing of a window of opportunity for the two-state solution for several years, setting such a short time frame by the secretary of state is unprecedented.

Hannah Allam of the McClatchy Newspapers tweeted:

The window for a 2-state solution is shutting, we have a year, year and a half before it’s over […] For Israel, for us, for world, not to strengthen the Palestinian Authority amounts to working against our own interests […] To not invest in the PA would be remarkably short-sighted. Netanyahu has agreed to engage in new economic plan in West Bank.

Later, Kerry added his own interpretation of the reasons for the current impasse:

[The] Palestinians [are] convinced Israel will never give them a state, Israel [is] convinced Palestinians will never give them security.

UPDATE: Here are Kerry’s exact words.

KERRY: But I can guarantee you that am committed to this, because I believe the window for a two-state solution is shutting. I think we have some period of time a year, a year and a half, to two years or its over. […] So there’s an urgency to this in my mind, and I intend, on behalf of the President’s instructions, to honor that urgency and see what we can do to move forward.

And later:

“Look, the hurdle we have to get over here, part of the difficulty is the level of mistrust on both sides is gigantic […] President Abbas deep-down is not convinced — and that may be a light word for it — that Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu and Israel are ever going to give them a state. And on the other side, Israel is not convinced that the Palestinians and others ever going to give them the security that they need. So we have to find an equation here, folks, where we can try to dispel those years of mistrust and get both sides to understand that both things are in fact possible.”

Kerry has already been criticized for his comments, and an Israeli source told the British Telegraph that “when it comes to the heart of the matter he [Kerry] has no bright ideas.”

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TEST TEST GAL Our team has been devastated by the horrific events of this latest war. The world is reeling from Israel’s unprecedented onslaught on Gaza, inflicting mass devastation and death upon besieged Palestinians, as well as the atrocious attack and kidnappings by Hamas in Israel on October 7. Our hearts are with all the people and communities facing this violence. We are in an extraordinarily dangerous era in Israel-Palestine. The bloodshed has reached extreme levels of brutality and threatens to engulf the entire region. Emboldened settlers in the West Bank, backed by the army, are seizing the opportunity to intensify their attacks on Palestinians. The most far-right government in Israel’s history is ramping up its policing of dissent, using the cover of war to silence Palestinian citizens and left-wing Jews who object to its policies. This escalation has a very clear context, one that +972 has spent the past 14 years covering: Israeli society’s growing racism and militarism, entrenched occupation and apartheid, and a normalized siege on Gaza. We are well positioned to cover this perilous moment – but we need your help to do it. This terrible period will challenge the humanity of all of those working for a better future in this land. Palestinians and Israelis are already organizing and strategizing to put up the fight of their lives. Can we count on your support? +972 Magazine is a leading media voice of this movement, a desperately needed platform where Palestinian and Israeli journalists, activists, and thinkers can report on and analyze what is happening, guided by humanism, equality, and justice. Join us.

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