Her comments were initially met with groans and boos from rally attendees. A woman shouted, “Ah, come on!”

But Clinton said she would address her concerns later in her speech, adding that her question was fair. He began by detailing the peace negotiations he led near the end of his second term, negotiations that fell apart at the last minute when, he said, the Palestinian leadership pulled out of the deal. The political realities in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza have changed considerably since then, he said.

“We’re going to have to build it again,” Clinton said. “The reason you should support Kamala Harris is not because she has a detailed plan and can’t have one. This was shattered into a million pieces (after the October 7th Hamas attack) and the facts are different. … It’s the hardest thing in the world, but I know one thing. I think we agree on that: We can’t kill ourselves to get out of this.”

Clinton said Trump could make matters worse by being too favorable to the Israeli government and empowering “the most dogmatic and authoritarian parts of it.”

“I knew a lot about it,” he said. “I did everything I could to fix it. I wanted it fixed. It should have been fixed. It was a mistake not to accept the deal. I’ve had other Arab leaders, who want privacy out of respect, call me and apologize for not trying to force them to accept the deal.”

“Here’s the thing: We could be celebrating 25 years of peace between Israel and the Palestinian state,” he continued. “I can’t tell you how many nights since last October I’ve had trouble sleeping because I’m thinking about what could have been.”

Turning to the election, Clinton said the choice between Trump and Harris would be made “without regard to our ability to influence” the ongoing conflict.

“So you have to choose,” he said. “If you want peace there, and you want it to be fair to both sides and lead to security for both sides, you have to choose the person who you think is the fairest and most likely to get it done. I wish I could give you a more satisfactory answer, but I can’t.”