JERUSALEM — Israel’s prime minister turned down a regional peace initiative last year that was brokered by then-American Secretary of State John Kerry, former US officials confirmed Sunday.
The action by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to contradict his stated goal of involving regional Arab powers in resolving Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians.
Netanyahu took part in a secret summit that Kerry organized in the southern Jordanian port city of Aqaba last February, which included King Abdullah II of Jordan and President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi of Egypt. The meeting was first reported by the Haaretz daily.
Two former Obama administration officials said Kerry proposed regional recognition of Israel as a Jewish state — a key Netanyahu demand — alongside renewal of the Palestinian peace talks, with the support of the Arab countries.
Netanyahu rejected the offer, which would have required a significant pullout from occupied land, saying he would not be able to garner enough support for it in his hard-line coalition government.
The initiative also appeared to be the basis of short-lived talks with moderate opposition leader Isaac Herzog to join the government, a plan that unraveled when Netanyahu chose to bring in nationalist leader Avigdor Lieberman instead and appoint him defense minister.
Herzog tweeted Sunday that ‘‘history will definitely judge the magnitude of the opportunity as well as the magnitude of the missed opportunity.’’
Two former top aides to Kerry confirmed that the meeting took place secretly on Feb. 21, 2016.
According to the officials, Kerry tried to sweeten the 15-year-old ‘‘Arab Peace Initiative,’’ a Saudi-led plan that offered Israel peace with dozens of Arab and Muslim nations in return for a pullout from territories captured in the 1967 Mideast war to make way for an independent Palestine.
Among the proposed changes were Arab recognition of Israel as the Jewish state, recognition of Jerusalem as a shared capital for Israelis and Palestinians, and softened language on the ‘‘right of return’’ of Palestinian refugees to lost properties in what is now Israel, the former officials said.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were still not authorized to discuss the secret meeting publicly, said the Egyptian and Jordanian leaders reacted positively to the proposal, while Netanyahu refused to commit to anything beyond meetings with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.
In Cairo, Sissi’s office issued a statement late Sunday that appeared to implicitly confirm that the meeting took place. It said Egypt been working toward a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Netanyahu himself did not address the newspaper report in his weekly Cabinet meeting and his office refused to comment.
Instead, the prime minister focused on last week’s visit to Washington to meet President Trump.
At that meeting, both Trump and Netanyahu talked about new ways forward with the Palestinians and raised the possibility of involving the broader Arab world in the process.
In a striking departure from American policy, Trump refrained from supporting a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
