Secretary of State John Kerry suggested that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should not discuss specific aspects of the Iranian nuclear negotiations when he appears tomorrow before a joint session of the U.S. Congress.

“[W]e are concerned by reports that suggest selective details of the ongoing negotiations will be discussed publicly in the coming days,” Kerry told reporters Monday. “I want to say clearly that doing so would make it more difficult to reach the goal that Israel and others say they share in order to get a good deal. Israel’s security is absolutely at the forefront of all of our minds, but frankly, so is the security of all the other countries in the region, so is our security in the United States. And we are very clear that as we negotiate with Iran, if we are able to reach the kind of deal that we’re hoping for, then it would have to be considered in its entirety and measured against alternatives.”


CNN reported Sunday that Netanyahu “will lay out the details of what he understands to be the nuclear agreement between world powers and Iran, hoping it will prompt lawmakers to question the administration and delay the March 24 deadline for a political agreement.”

Kerry declared that the deal he hopes to negotiate with the Iranians will ensure that t”he four pathways to a nuclear bomb have been closed off.”


“[T]hat is the task,” he said. “And we hope it is possible to get there, but there is no guarantee.”


Kerry prefaced his remarks to the press by faulting the United Nations Human Rights Council for showing “excessive bias” against Israel. The statement may be intended as a palliative in the currently-fraught relationship between the United States and Israel, or, at least, as political cover for an administration that reportedly threatened to intercept Israeli jets in the event that Netanyahu ordered an airstrike against Iran.

“We wanted to make it clear today that we think that that is an impediment that stands in the way of the progress that should be achieved here when we look at the wide array of the world’s ills and the many challenges that we need to speak out on with respect to human rights,” he said.