Washington: 'No Middle East peace during Obama's remaining term'

President Barack Obama has made a "realistic assessment" that a peace deal between Israelis and Palestinians is not possible during his final months in office, US officials said on Thursday.

The officials spoke to reporters ahead of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's visit to the White House on Monday. It will be the first time Obama and Netanyahu have met face-to-face since the United States and its international partners reached a nuclear accord with Iran.

Netanyahu was the world's number one critic of the deal, and lobbied Republican lawmakers to oppose its implementation.

While the Iran deal is expected to be a major focus of the leaders' talks, they'll also discuss a fresh wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence that began two months ago at a sensitive Jerusalem holy site and spread across Israel and into the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Officials said Obama and Netanyahu would discuss steps to prevent confrontations between the parties in the absence of a peace agreement.

They said that, while Obama remains committed to a two-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians, he does not believe such is possible before he leaves office in January 2017, barring a major shift.

Obama and Netanyahu have long had a tense relationship, which was further strained by the US president's insistence on a nuclear deal with Iran.

Netanyahu sees Iran's pursuit of a nuclear weapon as an existential threat to Israel, and has argued that the agreement leaves Tehran within reach of a bomb.

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US hits back over anti-American comments

Meanwhile, the United States has "taken offence" at comments by Netanyahu's new communications director, who accused President Barack Obama of anti-Semitism and suggesting that Secretary of State John Kerry had the mental abilities of a 12-year-old, the State Department said on Thursday.

It said Kerry had spoken to the Israeli leader on Thursday and understood that Netanyahu "will be reviewing" the appointment of Ran Baratz after the US-Israeli summit next week.

As head of public diplomacy and media, Baratz, a 42-year-old philosophy lecturer, will be tasked with improving Israel's reputation in the world. His remarks were published previous to his appointment, but did not prevent it.

"His comments about US officials, including the president and Secretary Kerry, we believe were troubling and offensive. We obviously expect government officials from any country, especially our closest allies, to speak respectfully and truthfully about senior US government officials," State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

Within hours of Baratz's appointment on Wednesday, Israeli media outlets found a clutch of cuttings, headline-grabbing quotes on Facebook and articles he had penned on news websites. Netanyahu's staff, it appeared, may not have checked.

An official said Baratz had apologised to Netanyahu in a phone conversation, and, in a subsequent statement, Netanyahu distanced himself from the comments - but indicated the appointment remained valid. He said the two would meet, at Baratz's request, after he returns from his US trip next week.

[Baratz's comments] are inappropriate and do not reflect my positions or the policies of the government - Binyamin Netanyahu

"I have just read the things that Dr Ran Baratz published on the web, including the comments about the Israeli president, the president of the United States and other public figures here and in the US. They are inappropriate and do not reflect my positions or the policies of the government," Netanyahu claimed.

White House welcomes apology

In Washington, White House spokesman Josh Earnest welcomed Baratz's apology and said his comments would not affect the ability of Obama and Netanyahu to advance their countries' mutual interest.

"It's readily apparent that that apology was warranted. But obviously the decisions that Prime Minister Netanyahu has to make about who will serve his government and represent him and his country are decisions that he rightfully will make on his own," Earnest told a news briefing.

In a Facebook entry last March, Baratz said Obama's response to a speech by Netanyahu to the US Congress, during which he criticised the emerging Iran deal, "was what modern anti-Semitism looks like in Western and liberal countries".

Obama said at the time that no one could dispute that Iran had repeatedly "engaged in the most venomous of anti-Semitic statements". But, the president said, Netanyahu offered no viable alternatives "to the core issue, which is how do we prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon".

In October last year, Baratz took aim at Kerry in an article on Mida, which bills itself as a "news and intellectual website" dedicated to providing information and views not prevalent in other Israeli media.

Baratz termed as "comical" remarks Kerry made on the occasion of a Muslim holiday, when he said Middle East leaders had told him feelings stirred by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were a factor in Islamic State recruitment.

"This is the time, then," Baratz wrote, "to wish the secretary of state success and count down two years on the calendar with the hope that someone in the State Department will then wake up and begin to see the world through the eyes of a man with a mental age above 12."