TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) – U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel on Tuesday on his 11th visit to the region since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war. The US government wants to revive ceasefire efforts following the killing of top Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, but so far all warring parties appear to be on board with the ceasefire.
Israel is still at war with Hamas, more than a year after the militant group’s Oct. 7 attack, and with Hezbollah, which launched a ground invasion in Lebanon earlier this month. Israel is also expected to attack Iran in response to Iran’s October 1 ballistic missile attack.
Blinken landed just hours after Hezbollah fired a barrage of rockets into central Israel, setting off air raid sirens in populated areas of the country and at the international airport, without causing any significant damage or injuries. The meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lasted more than two hours on Tuesday afternoon. He will also meet with President Isaac Herzog, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Strategy Minister Ron Dermer.
The Israeli military said it intercepted most of the five projectiles, with one landing in an open area. At about the same time, it announced that another 15 projectiles were fired from Lebanon toward northern Israel.
Lebanese hospitals fear being targeted by IsraelThe death toll from an Israeli airstrike late Monday that destroyed several buildings facing one of Beirut’s main hospitals has risen to 13. Lebanon’s Health Ministry said 57 people were injured, including seven in critical condition.
The Israeli military said it struck Hezbollah targets, but not the hospital itself, without providing details.
Associated Press reporters visited Rafik Hariri University Hospital, the country’s largest public hospital, on Tuesday. They witnessed broken windows in the hospital’s pharmacy and dialysis center, which was full of patients at the time.
The force of the explosion also destroyed some of the hospital’s solar panels. Staff said that amid their own panic, they had to deal with injured patients pouring into the hospital in the aftermath of the strike across the street.
Staff at another hospital in Beirut said the hospital was not targeted after Israel claimed, without providing evidence, that Hezbollah had hidden hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and gold in the hospital’s basement. I was worried.
The director of the Sahel General Hospital denied the allegations and invited journalists to visit the hospital and its two basement floors on Tuesday. An Associated Press reporter saw no signs of extremism or anything unusual.
The remaining few patients had been evacuated following the Israeli military’s announcement the night before. The rest left early due to repeated airstrikes in the surrounding area.
“We have been living in fear for the past 24 hours,” said hospital director Mazen Alameh. “There’s nothing underneath the hospital.”
Many in Lebanon fear that Israel will target their own hospitals in the same way it has attacked medical facilities across Gaza. The Israeli military has accused Hamas and other extremists of using the hospital for military purposes, but medical officials deny the claims.
If a hospital is used for military purposes, it may lose its protection under international law.
Blinken is expected to focus on the Gaza issue.
Ahead of his visit, the U.S. State Department announced that Blinken would focus on ending the war in Gaza, securing the release of Hamas hostages and alleviating the suffering of Palestinian civilians.
U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Mr. Blinken would emphasize the need to significantly increase the amount of humanitarian aid reaching Gaza, which Mr. Blinken and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin wrote to Israeli officials last week. This was made clear in a letter.
The letter reminded Israel that the Biden administration could be forced by U.S. law to cut some military aid if the delivery of humanitarian aid continues to be hampered.
Blinken’s previous trips have achieved little in terms of ending hostilities, although he has succeeded in the past in increasing aid deliveries to Gaza.
The United States, Egypt and Qatar are brokering months of talks between Israel and Hamas, with the militants seeking to strike a deal that would see the release of dozens of hostages in exchange for an end to the war, a permanent ceasefire and the release of Palestinians. . prisoners.
But Israel and Hamas accused each other of making new and unacceptable demands over the summer, and negotiations were suspended in August. Hamas says its demands have not changed after Sinwar’s killing.
US and Iran step up aid efforts ahead of expected Israeli attack
Blinken will meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu and other government officials and visit a number of Arab countries, including Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has crisscrossed the region in recent days to try to build support ahead of the threat of Israeli retaliatory strikes. Speaking in Kuwait on Tuesday, he said Gulf Arab states were committed not to allow their territory to be used for Israeli attacks.
“All our neighboring countries have assured us that they will not allow their lands and skies to be used against Iran,” Aragushi said, according to state news agency IRNA.
Gulf Arab states have not publicly provided such guarantees.
Gulf Arab states such as the UAE and Qatar have large-scale military facilities, and there are concerns that they could become embroiled in a full-scale regional war. Iran has repeatedly said it will respond to Israeli attacks.
War intensifies in Lebanon and northern Gaza
The United States has also been trying to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, but tensions escalated last month after a series of Israeli airstrikes killed the militant group’s top leader Hassan Nasrallah and most of his senior commanders. These efforts ended in failure.
Israel is carrying out another major operation in already devastated northern Gaza, where hundreds of Palestinians have been killed in the past two weeks, local health authorities said.
In Lebanon, Israel continued to carry out heavy airstrikes in southern Beirut and across southern and eastern Lebanon, areas where Hezbollah has a strong presence. Hezbollah has fired hundreds of rockets, missiles and drones into Israel, including some that have reached populated areas of the country.
Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking another 250 hostages. About 100 of the prisoners are still being held in Gaza, and a third of them are thought to have died.
Hezbollah began attacking Israel the day after the Hamas attack. Both groups are supported by Iran.
Israeli attacks have killed more than 42,000 Palestinians and injured tens of thousands in the Gaza Strip, according to local health officials, who did not say how many of them were fighters, but more than half were women. He is said to have been a child. It also caused massive destruction across the territory, displacing approximately 90% of the population of 2.3 million people.
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Sarah El Deeb reported from Beirut. Kareem Chehayeb and Bassem Mroue contributed to this report from Beirut.
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