Strained U.S.-Israeli Ties Reach Another Low After Kerry Speech

Strained U.S.-Israeli ties reached another low on Wednesday as Secretary of State John Kerry and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traded blame over the stalled Middle East peace process, with President-elect Donald Trump vowing a fresh start when he takes office on Jan. 20. Kerry, in a speech Wednesday in Washington, said Netanyahu’s policies backing the expansion of settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank were putting a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict increasingly out of reach. Netanyahu, minutes later, accused Kerry of anti-Israel bias and said the U.S. focus on settlements was “unbalanced.”