US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was traveling to the Middle East on Thursday for a series of consultations amid a resurgence in fears that the Israel-Hamas war will devolve into a larger regional conflict.
State Department spokesman Matt Miller said the secretary would make stops in Turkey, Greece, Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Israel, the West Bank and Egypt. This will be Blinken’s fourth trip to the Middle East since Hamas’s brutal October 7 onslaught triggered the war in Gaza.
Blinken was originally slated to arrive in Israel at the end of this week, but on Tuesday delayed his arrival to early next week.
In Israel, Blinken will discuss “transitioning to the next phase” of the war, Miller told reporters on Thursday. Specifically, this will entail “enabling Palestinians to return to their homes and neighborhoods as fighting curtails,” said the State Department spokesman.
Israel has thus far blocked Palestinians from northern Gaza, which it ordered to be evacuated in the early days of the war, arguing that fighters from Hamas and other terror groups remain in those areas. The remark by Miller represented a gradual intensification of US calls on Israel to allow Palestinians to return to northern Gaza where many of the homes have been destroyed in the fighting.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant presented a plan Thursday for a post-war Gaza, in which he said that residents of northern Gaza would not be allowed to return home until all the hostages taken by terror groups were freed.
Blinken will push the Israeli government to take “immediate measures to substantially increase humanitarian assistance to Gaza,” according to Miller. Before the war, some 500 goods trucks were entering Gaza each day. Since the war, that figure has plummeted to an average of less than 100 per day, save for a seven-day truce in late November when 200 aid trucks entered Gaza each day.
Israel agreed, following US pressure, to reopen its Kerem Shalom Crossing last month, allowing aid to directly enter Gaza from Israel for the first time along with aid through Egypt’s Rafah Crossing.
Israel reportedly has been weighing a series of further gestures aimed at maintaining US support for the war.
Miller added that Blinken will discuss with his Israeli counterparts concrete steps to mitigate civilian casualties in Gaza, reiterating that the civilian toll is far too high. However, at a press conference on Thursday, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the US “has not seen anything that would convince us that we need to take a different approach in terms of trying to help Israel,” despite the high number of civilian casualties.
Blinken will also talk with Israeli officials about “the need to do more to lower tensions in the West Bank,” Miller said, as the US continues to hold Jerusalem’s feet to the fire regarding settler violence and releasing tens of millions of dollars in tax revenues that belong to the Palestinian Authority.
Securing the release of the remaining hostages, including American citizens in Gaza, will be at the top of Blinken’s agenda during his trip, Miller said, asserting that the secretary will not rest until all of them are released.
Blinken will continue advancing the US effort to prevent the conflict in Gaza from fully spreading from other fronts and “will discuss specific steps parties can take, including how they can use their influence with others in the region to avoid escalation.”
As part of those discussions, Blinken will raise the need to take steps to deter Houthis attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea, Miller said.
The secretary will use his meetings to urge all parties to take steps to secure a permanent resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and promote a more integrated region, “including a sustained mechanism for reconstruction and Palestinian-led governance of a unified West Bank and Gaza,” according to Miller.
“We don’t expect every conversation on this trip to be easy. There are obviously tough issues facing the region and difficult choices ahead, but the secretary believes it is the responsibility of the United States of America to lead diplomatic efforts to tackle those challenges head-on, and he’s prepared to do that in the days to come,” the State Department spokesman said.
Blinken’s Middle East visit kicked off less than three days after Hamas terror chief Saleh al-Arouri was killed in an alleged Israeli airstrike in Beirut, and one day after twin explosions killed dozens at a memorial for Iranian Revolutionary Guard General Qassem Soleimani.
Both incidents have stoked apprehension that the Israel-Hamas war would expand into a wider regional conflict. Following Arouri’s killing, Hassan Nasrallah, leader of Iran’s Lebanese proxy Hezbollah, threatened war on Israel, whom he blamed for the killing, which he called “a major, dangerous crime about which we cannot be silent.”
However, the US and Israel have stressed that the alleged Israeli strike only targeted Hamas officials in Lebanon, and US State Department spokesman Matt Miller surmised Wednesday that Washington’s concern of the conflict escalating was no higher after Arouri’s killing than it was before.
Several lower-level Iranian officials blamed “Zionists” for the explosions at the memorial for Soleimani, though the Sunni terror group Islamic State, which is opposed to Iran’s Shiite regime, later claimed responsibility for the explosions.
US special envoy Amos Hochstein, who was dispatched to the Middle East in an effort to assuage tensions following Arouri’s assassination, met with Gallant on Thursday to discuss the possibility of diplomatic understandings with Hezbollah which would allow some 80,000 displaced residents of northern Israel to return to their homes.
Earlier on Thursday, French President Emanuel Macron called on Israel to refrain from escalation, “particularly in Lebanon,” a former French protectorate in whose internal affairs France is still intimately involved. The day before, Blinken had discussed de-escalation efforts with his French counterpart, Catherine Colonna.