Kerry to visit Mideast in bid to calm Palestinian-Israeli tensions
US secretary of state urges sides to avoid provocative statements that can inflame tensions further, saying 'This violence and any incitement to violence has got to stop.'
US Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday he plans to travel to the Middle East to try to calm violence between Palestinians and Israelis and move the situation "away from this precipice."
The trip would mark Kerry's most direct efforts to broker peace between the two sides since talks led by the United States failed last year.
"I will go there soon, at some point appropriately, and try to work to reengage and see if we can't move that away from this precipice," Kerry told an audience at an event sponsored by Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.
At least seven Israelis and 29 Palestinians, including 10 attackers, have died in the violence.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened an emergency meeting of his security cabinet, and officials said Israel was considering whether to seal off Palestinian districts in East Jerusalem, home of many of the assailants of the past two weeks, from the rest of the city.
Kerry said the United States' goal for the region, the two-state solution, "could conceivably be stolen from everybody" if violence were to spiral out of control.
"You have this violence because there's a frustration that is growing and a frustration among Israelis who don't see any movement," Kerry said.
In a press conference on Tuesday following his meeting with Australian counterpart, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, Kerry called the situation in Israel too volatile and stressed what he called the importance of all people to avoid what he called provocative statements that can inflame tensions further.
"This violence and any incitement to violence has got to stop," he said.
Kerry said he spoke with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the weekend to stress his concerns.
Days of violence have been stirred in part by Muslim agitation over increasing Jewish visits to the al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem, Islam's holiest site outside the Arabian Peninsula. It was also the site of two biblical Jewish temples.
The escalating violence has raised speculation that Palestinians could be embarking on another uprising or intifada, reflecting a new generation's frustrations over their veteran leadership's failure to achieve statehood.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
