Daily Beast national security reporter Josh Rogin said Tuesday that Israel's overwhelming rejection of Secretary of State John Kerry's ceasefire proposal was the "nail in the coffin" in his crumbling relationship with the Israeli government.
Kerry angered Israelis even before this latest crisis by first telling a closed-door meeting of world leaders in April that Israel could potentially turn into an "apartheid" state if a two-state solution wasn't reached, a story Rogin broke. Just last week, Kerry was caught on a hot mic mocking Israel's claim to be conducting a "pinpoint operation" in Gaza.
Now, as reported by Rogin and Eli Lake, Israelis feel that Kerry's peace proposal would effectively reward the terrorist group Hamas for launching a barrage of rockets into Israel.
"Kerry pushed for a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinian Authority and that left a lot of bad blood in Israel because they felt that he didn't represent their efforts sufficiently," Rogin said on CNN. "This is pretty much the nail in the coffin of John Kerry's relationship with the Israeli government. That's not to say that the U.S. still doesn't have an important role to play, and John Kerry continues to work on this ... but the damage to the relationship is done and it will have some lasting effects."