John Kerry Talks Peace Prospects With Israeli and Palestinian Leaders

Image by Getty Images
John Kerry spoke with Israeli and Palestinian leaders about peace prospects in the Middle East.
Kerry, the U.S. secretary of state, spoke on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday and met Wednesday with Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator.
Kerry raised with Netanyahu the Obama administration’s call for Israel to reverse its decision this week to appropriate 1,000 acres of West Bank land for settlement expansion, spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.
At their meeting Wednesday, Erekat presented to Kerry a plan for an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank within three years based on U.N. resolutions.
On Thursday, Psaki’s deputy, Marie Harf, would not comment on Erekat’s proposal.
“It was a constructive conversation, covered a range of issues including Gaza, Israeli-Palestinian relations and recent developments in the region,” she said. “They agreed to keep talking in the weeks ahead.”
Kerry, after intensive efforts to advance peace talks, has pulled back from involvement since talks collapsed in April.
Psaki said that Netanyahu and Kerry also discussed the threat posed in the Middle East by Islamist extremists, particularly the Islamic State, or ISIS, which this week beheaded Steven Sotloff, a journalist who was a dual Israeli-American citizen.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Fast Forward Ye debuts ‘Heil Hitler’ music video that includes a sample of a Hitler speech
- 2
Culture Cardinals are Catholic, not Jewish — so why do they all wear yarmulkes?
- 3
News School Israel trip turns ‘terrifying’ for LA students attacked by Israeli teens
- 4
Fast Forward Student suspended for ‘F— the Jews’ video defends himself on antisemitic podcast
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture Everything you need to know about every Pope Leo — even the antisemitic Leo and the one with the elephant
-
Culture A pocket guide to the Jewish grandmothers of Mexico
-
Opinion I supported Israel’s actions in Gaza in October 2023 — not anymore
-
Fast Forward Police clash with pro-Palestinian protesters in Brooklyn as Columbia library takeover fallout continues
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.