Secretary of State John Kerry touted the US’ relationship with Israel, arguing “we have a closer relationship with Israel right now, in terms of security, than at anytime in history” on Sunday’s “This Week” on ABC.
“We have a closer relationship with Israel right now, in terms of security, than at anytime in history. I was reviewing the record the other day. We have intervened on Israel’s behalf in the last two years, more than several hundred, a couple of hundred times, in over 75 different different fora in order to protect Israel. I talk to the prime minister regularly, including yesterday. We are not — we don’t want to see this [Netanyahu’s speech before Congress] turned into some great political football. Obviously, it was odd, if not unique that we learned of it from the Speaker of the House and the administration was not included in this process. But the administration is not seeking to politicize this. We want to recognize the main goal here is to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and on that, Israel and the United States agree” he stated.
Later, after saying that “Israel is safer today” thanks to the US’ interim agreement with Iran, Kerry continued “we have an unparalleled close security relationship with Israel, and we will continue to. President Obama has done more to ensure the security of Israel by the creation of Iron Dome, by the development of weapons that are specifically calculated to be able to deal with Iran’s nuclear weapon problem, and the president has pledged that they will not get a nuclear weapon.”
Kerry concluded that the US was going to “test” whether diplomacy would prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and that the US deserves “the benefit of the doubt” in negotiations with Iran.
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