{"id":287918,"date":"2016-12-31T02:37:00","date_gmt":"2016-12-31T01:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/theresa-may-attacks-john-kerrys-israel-speech-in-bid-to-please-trump-team\/"},"modified":"2016-12-31T02:37:00","modified_gmt":"2016-12-31T01:37:00","slug":"theresa-may-attacks-john-kerrys-israel-speech-in-bid-to-please-trump-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/theresa-may-attacks-john-kerrys-israel-speech-in-bid-to-please-trump-team\/","title":{"rendered":"Theresa May attacks John Kerry\u2019s Israel speech in bid to please Trump team"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.rt.com\/files\/2016.12\/thumbnail\/58663584c36188c2188b45a6.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>        In what appears to be an attempt to woo Donald Trump\u2019s incoming administration, British Prime Minister Theresa May has rebuked outgoing US Secretary of State John Kerry for condemning Israel.<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Kerry accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s government of being<em> \u201cthe most right-wing in Israeli history,\u201d<\/em> claiming the rapid expansion of settlements in the occupied territories shows that <em>\u201cthe status quo is leading toward one state and perpetual occupation.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>May\u2019s spokesman said the PM thought it was inappropriate to make such a strongly worded attack on the makeup of a democratically elected government.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cWe do not believe that it is appropriate to attack the composition of the democratically elected government of an ally,\u201d<\/em> the spokesman said, adding <em>\u201cthe government believes that negotiations will only succeed when they are conducted between the two parties, supported by the international community.\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Kerry\u2019s remarks added further strain to relations between Israel\u2019s coalition government and the outgoing Obama administration, which were rocked just last week, when the US cleared the way for the passage of a UN resolution which demands that an end be put to Israeli settlement building.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"900\" height=\"506\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/uQZVyHdNQQg\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Although the UK backed the UN resolution, May\u2019s spokesman said she was concerned about the language used by Kerry.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cWe continue to believe that the construction of settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories is illegal, which is why we supported UN security council resolution 2334 last week.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cBut we are also clear that the settlements are far from the only problem in this conflict. In particular, the people of Israel deserve to live free from the threat of terrorism, with which they have had to cope for too long,\u201d<\/em> the spokesman said.<\/p>\n<p>According to the Guardian, the US State Department reacted to May\u2019s statement with bluntness.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cWe are surprised by the UK Prime Minister\u2019s office given that Secretary Kerry\u2019s remarks \u2013 which covered the full range of threats to a two state solution, including terrorism, violence, incitement and settlements \u2013 were in-line with the UK\u2019s own longstanding policy and its vote at the United Nations last week,\u201d<\/em> the State Department said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>It went on to say: <em>\u201cWe are grateful for the strongly supportive statements in response to Secretary Kerry\u2019s speech from across the world, including Germany, France, Canada, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and others.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Tory chairman of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee Crispin Blunt has also questioned May\u2019s criticism.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He told the BBC that May was focusing on a <em>\u201cnarrow point\u201d<\/em> and expressed concerns she was doubting Kerry\u2019s analysis, which he described as <em>\u201ccompletely on the money.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cI have absolutely no idea what was behind No 10 briefing in the way that they did.\u201d<br \/><\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"rtcode\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect. They used to have a great friend in the U.S., but&#8230;&#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/realDonaldTrump\/status\/814113616110751744\">December 28, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-lang=\"en\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">not anymore. The beginning of the end was the horrible Iran deal, and now this (U.N.)! Stay strong Israel, January 20th is fast approaching!<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/realDonaldTrump\/status\/814114980983427073\">December 28, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<p>Trump, who took a staunchly pro-Israeli line during his election campaign, openly lobbied against the UN resolution.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cThe big loss for Israel in the United Nations will make it much harder to negotiate peace. Too bad, but we will get it done anyway!\u201d<\/em> Trump said.<\/p>\n<p>May reportedly wants to forge a close relationship with the Trump team.<\/p>\n<p>UK Ambassador Sir Kim Darroch said on Tuesday that there are hopes their relationship can be similar to that of Margaret Thatcher and her US counterpart, Ronald Reagan.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Via <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rt.com\/uk\/372246-may-kerry-trump-israel\/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=RSS\">RT<\/a>. This piece was reprinted by <a href=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\">RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In what appears to be an attempt to woo Donald Trump\u2019s incoming administration, British Prime Minister Theresa May has rebuked outgoing US Secretary of State John Kerry for condemning Israel. Kerry accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s government of being \u201cthe most right-wing in Israeli history,\u201d claiming the rapid expansion of settlements in the occupied [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":287919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-287918","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}