GAZA STRIP (Palestinian Territories): Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads to Israel on Friday to press for a truce in Gaza, ahead of a key UN Security Council vote on a US draft resolution on the need for an “immediate” ceasefire.
Israel’s main backer the United States announced it would submit for a vote on Friday a draft to the Security Council on the need for an “immediate ceasefire as part of a hostage deal”, after repeatedly using its veto power to block other similarly worded resolutions.
After talks in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Blinken flies to Israel on Friday, his sixth trip to the region since the war began with Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7.
Fighting in Gaza this week has centred around Al-Shifa hospital, the besieged territory’s largest, with Israel also vowing to launch a new ground assault in overcrowded Rafah in the south.
Israel said its spy chief would also head back to Qatar on Friday for more truce talks with US, Egyptian and Qatari mediators who are trying to negotiate a six-week pause.
The talks are focused on securing a truce agreement, hinged on the release of hostages held by Hamas in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli custody and the delivery of more aid to Gaza, where famine is threatening its 2.4 million people.
Blinken told reporters in Cairo on Thursday “gaps are narrowing” and that the United States was “continuing to push for an agreement in Doha”.
“It’s difficult to get there, but I believe it is still possible,” Blinken said. He warned that an Israeli ground offensive in Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city where around 1.5 million people are hemmed in by the Egyptian border, would be “a mistake”.
The United States will submit its draft resolution to the UN Security Council on Friday, a spokesman for the US representative to the world body said.
The US resolution “will unequivocally support ongoing diplomatic efforts aimed at securing an immediate ceasefire in Gaza as part of a hostage deal… we will be bringing this Resolution for a vote on Friday morning”, Nate Evans, spokesman for US Ambassador Linda ThomasGreenfield, said in a statement.
Israel’s relentless bombardment of Gaza has continued despite renewed diplomatic efforts, with the death toll in Gaza close to 32,000, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
Israel’s military said it had killed more than 140 Hamas fighters and arrested more than 350 since the start of its operation in and around Al-Shifa hospital on Monday. – AFP
