The Explosive, Inside Story of How John Kerry Built an Israel-Palestine Peace Plan—and Watched it Crumble
In The New Republic, Ben Birnbaum and Amir Tibon have penned an investigative report on Secretary of State John Kerry’s efforts over the past year to achieve a comprehensive Israel-Palestine peace plan. Between March 2013 and April 2014, Kerry led a long round of peace talks between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Although they appeared to make a fair amount of progress, the talks ultimately collapsed in April, leading to further pessimism regarding the prospects for reaching a long-term solution in the near future. Avi Dichter, the former chief of Israel’s Shin Bet intelligence agency, said, “The American effort will always be multiplied by the amount of trust between the two leaders. So if Kerry’s pressure represents the number five, and then Obama’s helps bring the American effort to ten, it really doesn’t matter. You’re still multiplying it by zero. The final result will always be zero.”