Kerry congratulates Netanyahu on election victory

US Secretary of State John Kerry called Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday to congratulate him on his Likud party’s strong showing in Israel’s general elections.

In keeping with White House protocol, President Barack Obama is likely to only release an official statement once all of the ballots have been counted.

The White House said Wednesday it still believes a two-state solution is the best way to find peace in the Middle East, after Netanyahu ruled out the creation of a Palestinian state.

Obama believes a two-state solution is “the best way to resolve the situation,” according to White House spokesman Josh Earnest, who added that Obama had not yet called to congratulate Netanyahu on his election victory.

Other Western governments gave a muted reaction to Netanyahu’s emerging reelection amid fears that his increasingly hard-line rhetoric has fatally undermined the Middle East peace process.

The EU congratulated Netanyahu, but said it was committed to relaunching the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians that he had rejected in the last days of the campaign.

British Prime Minister David Cameron took a similar stance, tweeting his congratulations but letting his spokesman emphasize that “he wants to see peace, wants to see a two-state solution”.

“Congratulations to Netanyahu on election result,” Cameron wrote. “As one of Israel’s firmest friends, UK looks forward to working with new government.”

The United Nations said in a statement that it too expected Netanyahu to push ahead with a peace process that leads to an independent Palestinian state.

In a last-minute lurch to the right just before Tuesday’s election, Netanyahu vowed that a Palestinian state would never be formed on his watch.

A less reserved response came from Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who posted a message to his Twitter account, in both Hebrew and English, congratulating Netanyahu on his victory.

“Congratulations my friend Bibi @netanyahu! Recall our New York meeting last September warmly,” he wrote.

A White House official offered congratulations to the Israeli people on the elections, although he did not mention Netanyahu by name.

“We want to congratulate the Israeli people for the democratic process for the election that they just engaged in with all the parties that engaged in that election,” White House Director of Political Strategy Outreach David Simas told CNN.

“As you know now, the hard work of coalition building begins,” he continued. “Sometimes that takes a couple of weeks. And we’re going to give space to the formation of that coalition government and we’re not going to weigh in one way or another except to say that the United States and Israel have a historic and close relationship and that will continue going forward.”

Netanyahu’s Likud party appeared en route to win 29 or 30 parliamentary seats, making it the largest party in the Knesset, and some six seats ahead of second-place rival the Zionist Union, which secured 24 seats.