'Kerry, You Coward!': Palestinians Protest Arrival of US Envoy in Occupied West Bank

'Framework agreement' is biased toward Israel, say Palestinians, but the so-called "peace process" has problems deeper than that

Common Dreams 

 

(Brendan Smialowski/Pool)

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv January 2, 2014. Palestinian protesters greeted U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Ramallah on Friday with chants of "Kerry, you coward" and "Kerry go home" as he traveled to the West Bank to meet with Mahmoud Abbas, head of the Palestinian Authority, amid the latest round of talks between the Israeli government and the PA.

Palestinian critics of Kerry say the negotiations have so far favored the demands of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with whom Kerry met with on Thursday and Friday morning before heading to the West Bank.

Reuters reports:

Hours before Kerry was due to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a raucous crowd of several hundred took to the streets of Ramallah, the West Bank's de facto capital, chanting "Kerry, you coward, there's no place for you in Palestine!"

Separately, an official close to Abbas dismissed Kerry's drive for a "framework agreement" as biased toward Israel. [...]

Palestinian and Israeli officials have publicly differed on the future status of the West Bank's border with Jordan, where Israelis want a permanent security presence but Palestinians want a full withdrawal of Israeli soldiers and Jewish settlers.

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