Kerry condemns Palestinian attacks

OCUPIED-AL-QUDS: US Secretary of State John Kerry expressed strong support for Israel and condemned a wave of Palestinian attacks on Tuesday as he met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to try to ease weeks of violence.
Arriving with scant hopes for a major breakthrough, Kerry discussed with Netanyahu ways of calming tensions and planned to do the same later in the day with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah. With the region’s focus on the conflict in Syria, where a Russian fighter jet was downed by Turkey, Netanyahu gave no sign he would acquiesce to the American expectation of concrete measures to calm the volatile situation.
Netanyahu had told Kerry that the root of the current wave of violence was Palestinian "incitement on social media," and said that "civilian Palestinian projects" would be allowed to advance only when Israel experiences a "return of the quiet," an Israeli official said. The premier also conditioned Palestinian construction in Israeli-controlled parts of the West Bank on international recognition of Israel’s right to build in settlement blocs, the official said.
Ahead of meeting Netanyahu, Kerry condemned the wave of Palestinian attacks on Israelis since the start of October.
"Clearly, no people anywhere should live with daily violence, with attacks in the streets, with knives, with scissors, cars," Kerry told reporters at Netanyahu’s office ahead of their talks.