Blinken urges Hamas to accept Israel’s ceasefire proposal

Foreign Minister Antony J. Blinken spoke with Arab officials in Saudi Arabia on Monday about the war between Israel and Hamas and the difficult issues it has created, from humanitarian aid to hostages. Mr. Blinken plans to visit Jordan and Israel on Tuesday.

Shortly after landing in the Saudi capital Riyadh, Mr. Blinken met with Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, and then the foreign ministers of five other Arab countries in the Persian Gulf and a top foreign policy adviser. He will form the Gulf Cooperation Council along with Saudi Arabia. Prince Faisal was also a part of that second meeting. On Monday night, Mr. Blinken met with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

The State Department listed the ceasefire and hostage issues first in its released summary of Mr Blinken’s face-to-face meeting with the prince. “The two discussed ongoing efforts to reach an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, which would ensure the release of hostages held by Hamas,” the department said.

The two diplomats also talked about greater regional integration and “a path to Palestinian statehood with security guarantees for Israel,” the summary said. This was the context of negotiations on a comprehensive agreement in which the United States, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Palestinian representatives would agree to terms that would result in the creation of a Palestinian state and greater diplomatic recognition for Israel in the region.

Mr. Blinken planned to meet a group of Arab and European officials on Monday to talk about plans to rebuild Gaza, even though Israel is still waging its war there and pursuing its difficult — and perhaps impossible — goals. Has not retreated from. To completely eliminate Hamas.

Saudi Arabia is hosting a three-day meeting of the World Economic Forum, and top Arab officials, including Mr. Blinken’s diplomatic counterparts, are attending the event in Riyadh. The gathering includes senior ministers from Qatar and Egypt, along with two Arab mediators in several rounds of talks on a possible ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

“The fastest way to end this is a ceasefire and the release of the hostages,” Mr Blinken said in a conversation on the platform with Borge Brende, president of the World Economic Forum. “Hamas has an offer that is exceptionally generous from Israel. And right now, the only thing standing between the people of Gaza and a ceasefire is Hamas.”

“I hope they take the right decision and we can bring about fundamental changes in mobility,” he said.

Mr Blinken and other top aides to President Biden are also trying to push for a long-term political solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, where a comprehensive agreement is reached. One call was to pave the way for Shri. Blinken’s visit, his seventh to the region since the war began, came as Mr Biden and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke by phone for about an hour on Sunday afternoon.

According to a White House statement released after the call, the two leaders discussed “increasing the delivery of humanitarian assistance to Gaza,” and Mr. Biden reiterated his warning against the Israeli ground attack on Rafah in southern Gaza. He also reviewed talks with Mr Netanyahu on the hostage release.

In its best-case scenario, the Biden administration envisions Saudi Arabia and perhaps some other Arab countries agreeing to normalize diplomatic relations with Israel. In return, Saudi Arabia will receive advanced weapons and security guarantees from the United States, including a mutual defense treaty and a commitment for American cooperation on the civilian nuclear program in the kingdom.

US and Saudi officials say that for its part, Israel must commit to a concrete path to the establishment of a Palestinian state with specific deadlines.

“I think it’s clear that in the absence of a real political horizon for the Palestinians, it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to actually create a coherent plan for Gaza,” Mr. Blinken said in a public briefing on Monday. ,

Prince Faisal said on Sunday that Saudi officials expected to discuss concrete steps toward creating a Palestinian state during Mr. Blinken’s visit to Riyadh. Describing the war and humanitarian crisis in Gaza as “a complete failure of the existing political system”, he told a press conference that the state’s government believes the only solution is “a credible, irreversible path to a Palestinian state.”

Before the war broke out last October, US and Saudi officials were in intense discussions to reach an agreement on the terms of such a proposal. For those negotiators, a big question at the time was what Israel would agree to. Since the war began, the Americans and Saudis have publicly insisted that Israel must agree to the existence of a Palestinian state.

But Israeli leaders and civilians have become even more resistant to that idea since the October 7 attacks, in which Israeli officials say Hamas and allied gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took about 240 hostages. Made it. Gaza health ministry officials say Israel’s retaliatory military offensive has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, including thousands of children.

Vivian Nereim And Zolan Kanno-Youngs Contributed to the reporting.