Sen. Ted Cruz speaks at the 2014 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland. Photo: Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons.

JNS.org – U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who may be considering a 2016 presidential run, on a visit to Israel blasted the Palestinians for derailing the U.S.-brokered peace talks.

Cruz, who met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior Israeli officials on Sunday, said the Palestinians are to blame for the talks’ collapse for refusing to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and renouncing terrorism.

“The principal impediment to peace is that, to date, the Palestinians have refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and have refused to renounce terror,” Cruz told The Jerusalem Post.

Cruz also criticized U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry for using the term “apartheid” when discussing Israel’s possible future if peace talks fail.

“Those words will be repeated by enemies of Israel, by Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran, and all of them will say, ‘This is not our characterization, these are the words of the U.S. secretary of state,'” Cruz said.