US Secretary of State John Kerry will meet next week with Israeli and Palestinian leaders in the region to try to stop ongoing violence, although senior US official insisted it was not a renewed effort to broker a peace accord. The State Department said Kerry will travel to Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Ramallah on a trip that will also include a stop in the United Arab Emirates to discuss the Syrian conflict.
Kerry last met with Netanyahu in Berlin in October to try to end a spate of bloodshed and stop what Washington regarded as provocative statements by Israeli and Palestinian leaders over the management of Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque. With the latest visit, Kerry hopes to move things in a "more positive direction" and prevent the collapse of the Palestinian Authority, the official said. The talks will explore a "variety of ideas" on how to ease tensions, the official said without elaborating. The official said violence had abated somewhat over the course of a few weeks but picked up again in recent days, with the killing of five people in attacks in Tel Aviv and in the occupied West Bank. An American was among the dead.