KERRY TO ATTEND MIDEAST PEACE CONFERENCE IN PARIS:
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USA Secretary of State John Kerry will attend a Middle East peace conference in Paris on Sunday 15 Jan. 2017 in a move likely to dismay an already angry Israel. Neither Israel nor the Palestinian leadership will attend the talks, and PM Benjamin Netanyahu has said the meeting will only widen the gaps between Israel and the Palestinians. Just weeks after the UN Security Council voted to condemn Israeli settlement building, the talks are meant to underline global support for a two-state peace deal. Washington abstained on the UN vote rather than casting its usual veto, and last month Kerry made a major speech laying out proposed parameters of a two-state solution. Netanyahu insists that outside powers cannot impose a settlement on Israel and the Palestinians and has called for direct talks between the parties.
Around 70 countries will gather for the conference and they are expected to throw their weight behind calls for a halt to settlement building and a negotiated peace. France has been planning to hold a conference for months, but Washington had refused until 10 Jan. 2017 to confirm that its top diplomat would attend. Diplomats have played down rumors the foreign envoys could draft a new UN resolution to codify plans for two states in international law. Sunday’s stop in Paris, at a conference chaired by President Francois Hollande, will come halfway through Kerry’s last foreign trip as secretary of state. (Times of Israel) Pray that global leaders, will understand there is absolutely zero chance Israel is going to comply with any plan for a future Palestinian state based on pre-1967 lines. It is a ludicrous objective, one which a long line of Israeli government and military leaders have considered to be "suicidal,” for the Jewish state.