(Washington) US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to the Middle East next week to promote a proposed ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, the State Department announced Friday.
Mr. Blinken, whose eighth visit to the region since the conflict began on October 7, will visit Israel, Egypt, Qatar and Jordan from Monday to Wednesday, his ministry said.
He “will discuss with partners the need to reach a ceasefire agreement that guarantees the release of all hostages,” the State Department spokesperson said in a statement.
“He will emphasize the importance of Hamas accepting the proposal on the table, which is almost identical to the one Hamas approved last month,” he added.
Antony Blinken will insist during his tour that the proposal would benefit both Israelis and Palestinians, the spokesman said.
He will thus emphasize that it would “alleviate the suffering in Gaza, massively increase humanitarian aid and allow Palestinians to return to their neighborhoods.”
He will also mention that it would pave the way for restoring “calm along Israel’s northern border, so that displaced Israeli and Lebanese families can return home.”
US President Joe Biden, a fervent supporter of Israel but desperately seeking a way out of the conflict in the midst of his re-election campaign, detailed on May 31 the broad outlines of a step-by-step plan, which he said Israel had proposed.
The United States is leading an intense diplomatic campaign to rally support for this proposal.
A senior Hamas official said Thursday that the plan presented by Joe Biden was not a “new proposal.” “So far, the Americans have not presented any document that commits them to what Biden said in his speech,” he said.
An Israeli government spokesperson said the plan in question was “incomplete.”
In Jordan, Antony Blinken will also attend a conference on the humanitarian response to Gaza.